The man in the lab coat landed on the ground and was followed out the window by another man, also in a lab coat. Both ran towards the wooded area. Jerry grabbed his binoculars. It was Woodrow; he had made it out and was on the move. The two men were followed by a much larger man who dropped and landed flat on his ass. He got up and ran after the first two, tripping twice.
Either the guy was infected and was losing his coordination, or he was just a clumsy fat fuck. Either way, he was not a threat. Jerry needed to get down there and find his friend before he was captured or eaten. There was no way he was ending his day empty handed.
Chapter 18
Exit 117
Emergency Alert Text Message sent to all subscriber residents in Northern N.J.:
The Garden State Parkway southbound lane has been closed just after Exit 117 as emergency response vehicles respond to a commercial office building fire.
Again, all lanes on southbound GSP are closed, please avoid the area and take alternate routes.
This text was re-tweeted with forwarders adding their own comments.
Chapter 19
M*A*S*H
In a temporary hospital set up in a parking lot of a Wal-Mart, a military officer was standing on a makeshift platform addressing a large number of medical staff dressed in white, all wearing N95 masks. Colonel Parker had originally joined the military to combat germs and viruses, rather than Al Qaida. His build was thin and his glasses were thick, and if you were filming a movie where you needed a 45-year-old nerd, he would easily be cast. Under the right circumstances, however, he was the man that even the most battle hardened, square jawed, steely eyed killer of a general would turn to as their warrior of choice. This was one of those circumstances.
Colonel Parker spoke to the assembled first receivers in the makeshift MASH. “While we cannot be sure the threat has airborne pathogen characteristics, we must take all precautions to prevent the spread throughout the human population. We will all be following the guidelines laid out in the National Strategy for Pandemic Influenza Implementation Plan. We have implemented some additional procedures based on the unique circumstances surrounding this particular outbreak.
“All hospital first responders are to follow the following procedures. Should patients arrive that are exhibiting no immediate signs of infection, they are to be provided a pager and told to return and secure themselves in their personal vehicles outside of the medical center and to wait for pager to go off. Just like waiting for a table at Chili’s.”
Some brief, nervous laughter erupted from those gathered.
“Inform them that the wait could be over one hour and they are not to return to the center until they are paged. Tell them this is for their own safety and to prevent the spread of a virulent case of the flu that has been identified in this area. Page them exactly one hour later. Those that return with no symptoms of infection are to be sent home and told to stay in their houses. Those showing signs of infection are to be moved towards the ‘receiving’ facilities we are setting up at the rear of all local hospitals. The military will then handle those affected.” The Colonel swallowed deeply. “Those that have ‘turned’ during the hour wait will most likely not be able to extract themselves from their vehicles and will be collected by our Disaster Mortuary Operational Response Teams or DMORT. All medical personnel are to wear the personal protective equipment as described in the guidance sheets provided. Thank you, now please return to your posts and we will have the next briefing in two hours.”
Chapter 20
Welcome To New Jersey
Pat was awakened in his hotel room by a violent thud against the wall. He looked around the room disoriented, then he heard shouts from the parking lot. He sat up and looked at the clock: 3:30 AM. He could hear sirens in the distance, as well as muffled screams and glass smashing in the parking lot. He went over and looked out the window and saw people running through the maze of parked cars; it looked like some were being attacked.
Pat called front desk and someone picked up, but there was no response on the other end of the receiver.
“Hello? Hello? Um, there looks to be some sort of a fight in the parking lot.”
Christ, welcome to New Jersey, Pat thought to himself.
“Hello? Is anyone there?” he asked again.
The line disconnected. Pat called the front desk again but now the phone line was busy. He called again, but this time nothing, no busy signal, no phantom answer. He lay down again on the bed and listened to the yelling from the parking lot. He turned on the TV, but all the channels were static. More sirens, screams, and banging on the wall from the room next door. He looked out window again and saw the fight was continuing.
He grabbed his cell phone and dialed 911 but all he got was a busy signal, even after several tries. He called a couple of numbers in his phone contacts list, but all circuits were busy.
Pat looked out hotel door, saw some freaks running down the hallway in his direction, and slammed the door shut. He sat on the edge of bed trying to make sense of all that was happening. He picked up his iPhone and looked at the HELP app icon that James had loaded. After running his finger across the screen over the icon a couple of times, he hesitantly pressed it and held it down for ten seconds. The phone made a violent jolt in his hand and started to vibrate.
A message popped up that read:
“Emergency Notification has been activated. To deactivate, press and hold immediately”
Pat considered cancelling the HELP request, but when another large thud sounded against his room door he withdrew his thumb. A few more seconds went by, and a text message popped up:
Stay put, Pat. Don’t leave location. Stay away from door and windows.
The iPhone then began a slow and steady pulse, vibrating every couple of seconds.
Chapter 21
Like Really Real
Chapter 22
Quarantine
It had been nearly thirty minutes and the HELP icon continued to pulse. Pat got himself dressed and packed his suitcase. The screams from outside had gotten louder, or perhaps there were more people screaming. He again sat on the edge of his bed and contemplated what was happing. He sent several texts to his wife, but received no responses, only a message of ‘No Network Connectivity’.
After thirty more minutes passed, Pat stood up and approached the room door thinking that perhaps he was overreacting. The parking lot seemed to be quieting down. He reached for the doorknob and only then realized that his hands were shaking. He looked out the peephole and could see the maid, standing in the hallway with her back to his door. She looked slightly disheveled but not out of place. Was that blood on her shoulder? He thought so, but he could not be sure with such a distorted view through the warped glass. A tremendous crash caused the entire hotel to shudder.
Pat ran to the window and saw a large UHAUL truck had sideswiped the rear of the building. He noticed a familiar figure scrambling to the roof of the truck.
“Patrick! Patrick!” called the man atop the UHAUL.
He looked and sure enough, it was Dan Sullivan.
Pat opened the window. “Dan? What the hell? Are you kidding me?” Then he noticed multiple bodies around the parking lot, some in various states of dismemberment, and the true scope of the situation hit him.
“Jump! Jump now!” Dan yelled, but Pat could not will his legs to do so. It was a good twenty feet down. There was no way he was jumping.
Dan realized he would need to extract Pat from the room. “What room are you in?” he called up.
“Um…” Pat looked at his room key sleeve. “Room 515.”
Dan was gone, and within two minutes, he heard intense banging on the room door. Pat opened it to find Dan dressed in full commando gear, head to toe GI Joe.
Pat smiled like it was a joke for a minute, until he saw the maid in the hallway writhing on the ground with an obvious bullet wound to the temple.
“Christ did you…” Before he could finish his sentence, Dan was pu
lling him down the hallway towards the emergency exit. Another body lay on the ground in an appending hallway and he could hear slamming and thuds from the inside of other rooms, as if people were locked in and trying to break out.
As they made their way down the stairs and into the lobby, Pat froze. The lobby, which had been meticulously decorated only hours ago, was in shambles.
“What happened, was there some sort of high school reunion brawl that got out of hand here?” Then he noticed the blood, it was smeared on the walls and floor. The feet of the bellman lay jutting out from behind his stand, and broken glass was everywhere. Two deranged individuals came shuffling out of the breakfast bar area directly at Dan and Pat. Their eyes, both vacant and psychotic at once, focused on the duo. Unsteady but determined, they began to run towards Pat and Dan.
Dan gave a side kick to the first one, the bottom of his boot connecting squarely in the attacker’s chest, sending the freak flying backwards. He grabbed a chair and tossed it at the second. The first attacker got up and made it closer to Dan, only to find a 7-inch commando knife thrust into his chest. It appeared to cause him no harm and the assailant, who still bore the nametag Chad - Front Desk Manager, continued to grab at and attempt to bite Dan.
Dan managed to bend over and send him again flying backwards with a boot to the stomach. The second man regained his balance from being hit with the chair and moved forward, to which Dan let fly three rapid gunshots, two to the man’s head, one just above the stomach. The final shot slowed, but not fully stop, the attacker.
Pat stood in shock. Dan again grabbed him by the elbow and pulled him forward out the door into the parking lot. The carnage there was worse than he could see from his balcony. The parking lot brawlers were still there, and they were bent over their victims, ripping at them with their hands and teeth like jackals. Dan pushed Pat into the passenger side of the UHAUL truck and climbed over him to get to the driver’s side. He was nearly in when two hands grabbed his boot. Once again it was their friend Chad - Front Desk Manager, gaping chest wound from the knife oozing blood.
Dan again pulled out his gun and aimed for the attacker’s head. The gun being only inches from Pat’s face caused him to instinctively dive face first into the car seat, the sound and heat of the blast still jarring. Dan positioned himself at the steering wheel and Pat sat up unsteadily.
“Mind closing the door?” Dan said casually to his stunned passenger.
Pat snapped out of his haze to see Chad, face nearly missing from the gunshot, chest open from the knife, again getting back onto his feet for another go at them. Three others were moving behind him towards the truck. All appeared emaciated, skeletal-like.
“PAT! Close the fucking door!” Dan shouted, shocking Pat out of his trance.
Pat reached to his right and slammed the door shut as Dan put the truck in drive, pushing cars and bodies out of the way, driving towards the hotel parking lot exit. They careened out onto the main road, drove a couple hundred yards away from the hotel and then Dan stopped the truck. He jumped out of the cab of the truck, while Pat sat still, continuing to stare out the window in a daze. Dan had seen this reaction before in battle when newbies encountered their first really hairy conflict, and he worried that Pat was going into shock.
Dan ran over to Pat’s side of the truck and pulled open the passenger door. Pat, jolted by his door opening unexpectedly, began instinctively swinging and kicking in the direction of the opened door at the perceived attacker.
“Easy tiger,” Dan said mockingly, dodging the flying fists and feet, and he grabbed Pat out of the cab and brought him to a waiting car. Dan tossed Patrick into the passenger seat, and then assumed the driver position and in less than ninety seconds, they were again speeding down the road. Pat came out of his trance and spoke, his voice sounding as if it were not his own.
“What… what is happening?”
Dan handed Pat a small satellite phone and hit the call answer button. Pat looked at the device inquisitively for a second and placed it to his ear.
The voice of James Sullivan came on the line.
“Congressman, are you okay?”
Pat didn’t answer.
“Hello? Patrick, are you okay?”
“Y-Yes,” Pat said weakly. “Jimmy? What is going on?”
James, calmly, but with a voice filled with obvious concern replied, “Pat, I don’t know how long we will be connected, so listen. Something has happened in New Jersey, some sort of outbreak. The Army is trying to contain it, but their efforts are failing. Right now, it is contained in one area of South Jersey, but it is spreading fast, and those infected are attacking those that are not, causing them to become infected as well. It also appears to be spreading by other means, not yet identified.”
“What are they, some sort of psychos or cannibals or something?” Pat said.
“On the web they are calling them ‘Skells’ due to their skeletal-like appearance. The authorities are going all out to contain this. All tunnels, bridges and roads leading in or out of Jersey have been closed. It is complete statewide quarantine. Word is that any plane attempting to take off is being forced to land, or shot down. Several people have tried to run through barricades and have been shot dead. No one is getting out of the state right now.”
Pat looked up in the sky to see if he could spot a plane anywhere. “How is this possible? Where are you?”
“Listen, Pat. We have a way to get you out. We have a small three-man submarine down in Cape May we use for certain runs to the islands and such. It is the only way to get you two out of the state without being blown to smithereens. You need to get down to Cape May as fast as you can. Things are getting worse and the military does not seem to be able to get control of this thing. When people start waking up and leaving their homes to go to work, it will be like a thousand lit matches being thrown in a fuel spill at once. This thing will explode and all hell is going to break loose.”
Pat nodded his head in a daze, only partially processing what James was saying.
“So listen to me, get to Cape May. You remember my place down there from last summer, Exit 0 off of the parkway? It’s your only way out. Put Dan on the phone.”
Pat handed the phone to Dan, who listened to the receiver for a few minutes, then annoyed, shouted into the phone, “Yeah, yeah, I know. Shut the fuck up and let me do this.” And with that brotherly sendoff, he threw the phone into the back seat.
They passed a 7-11, where through the glass windows they could see a clerk fighting off two attackers with a mop handle. Dan pulled onto the parkway, where a few speeding cars passed them, but otherwise traffic was normal for that time of morning.
Pat leaned out the window and puked.
Chapter 23
Bang Bang Club
Virgil sat at the desk in the back office of his strip club. He was in the middle of holding court with two of his men seated in front of him when his phone rang. Annoyed at having his story interrupted, he picked up the receiver to take the call from James Sullivan.
“Yeah, Jim, I got no idea what you’re talking about. Nothing happening here, just a couple of drunks fighting in the parking lot earlier, but when isn’t there a fight in the parking lot?”
He paused and listened before again interrupting James.
“Yeah, okay, Cape May. Shit, like I got nothing but time on my fucking hands. I’m busy here. I’ll see what I can do.” Virgil hung up the phone and lit a cigar. He offered the box of Cubans to the two tough looking characters sitting in front of him. One took a cigar, the other refused.
“What’s the matter with you?”
“I don’t smoke cigars, V,” the lackey responded.
“Want me go to the store and get you some Virginia Slims?” Virgil held out his hand holding a $10 bill towards the other man. “Paulie, go down to the corner store and get this numb-nuts some Slims.”
Paulie, the other cigar smoker, guffawed. “You don’t refuse what Big V offers you.”
“Hey, if
you don’t want to smoke ’em now, you can put them in your purse for later,” Virgil chided the lackey, “right next to your tampons.”
V leaned back, blowing smoke in the air with a smile, knowing that the object of his insults was unable to provide a retort without brutal consequences. A buzz came from the intercom on his desk.
Virgil leaned over and pushed the blue button to talk. “What is it?”
The high pitched voice of Augie, the thick-necked bouncer who ate a side of steroids with each meal of the day came across the intercom. “You’re not gonna fucking believe who is standing at the front door, V. It’s that scumbag cop.”
V rolled his eyes. “You’re going to have to be more specific, Aug.”
“That fuckin Irish mick detective. The one you know. MacGyver or something.”
Virgil shook his head at the stupidity of his minions. “It’s McGreevy, you asshole.”
Virgil and Sean McGreevy had taken separate paths in life, but remained tied together through mutual relationships. They were always cordial to each other, even though neither had much respect for each other’s chosen profession.
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