“Run!” I tried to sound heroic as I motioned toward the elevator doors as they slid open.
Only ten or fifteen feet remained and, hoping Frank and the woman would follow, I leapt toward the waiting entrance. I dove into the elevator and slammed against the back wall. The elevator lights flashed and then the doors closed. Out of breath, on my knees, I dove forward to hit a button, any button, but it was too late, and the doors closed in my face allowing me a glimpse of the lady doctor and, let me tell you, if looks could kill I’d be a goddamn corpse right now.
3
I had always worried that the world was going to end, but I thought it would happen a lot later in my lifetime. I would be retired, sitting on a pier somewhere with a fishing pole in one hand, a beer in the other, while I waited for a catfish to bite. Then it would suddenly happen.
Maybe it would be a rapid change in the weather, and we’d be covered in sheets of ice. Or nukes would turn us into ash, or create a nuclear winter where we all starved to death or ate each other. My mom said that she’d spent most of the 80s terrified the the bombs would drop any day. Tensions between Russia and the U.S. had been high during the Cold War and that decade was, according to her, one of the worst. I guess they still taught kids how to hide under their desks back then. Should have taught them the delicate art of placing their head between their thighs, and kissing their ass goodbye.
EMP attacks were another popular ending in books and movies. The way that worked was a nuke exploded way up high and it fried CPUs, and just about anything else that wasn’t shielded. Cars would die, computers, phones, you name it. So then everyone starts scrambling around to survive, and since electronics don’t work anymore, it’s chaos on the ground. I don’t know, maybe I’m a Natty Light half-keg full kind of guy, but it sounds like that would piss people off more than it would put an end to humanity. Seriously. All those expensive iPhones, and laptops out there? It would be chaos as everyone rushed to get their claim their warranties.
The favorite way the world was going to end, according to me and my friends was: zombies. See, I’m not even going to beat around the bush here and pretend like I’ve never heard of the undead. I always imaged Rick from The Walking Dead waking up one morning, looking outside, and saying, “Zombie… what’s a zombie?”
What a dumbass.
Zombies are a strong part of our culture and to pretend like they aren’t an inevitability was a joke. I mean, sure, the dead probably won’t come out of the ground for logistical reasons. A dead dude, six feet under, would have been reduced to bones in just a few years. Imagine corpse that were buried in the 70s. They wouldn’t be able to get a claw hand out of the dirt before it crumbled into dust. You’d need a whole lot of fresh corpses if you were going to have a full-scale run on zombies. That meant that they would have to be unleashed another way.
I know what you’re thinking and I’m not even a mind reader. Jake Turner, you sir, are an idiot.
I know!
I’ve watched zombie movies, television zombie series, played zombie games, and even read a few zombie books. So what did I think I was doing by messing around with the guy in the cage? For one thing, he wasn’t a drooling moron with white eyes and a lust for brains. When I spotted him he was just a person hiding in the corner of the room. He hadn’t even been that big.
Like I said, I know!
I had merely hit a button and had released that poor guy from some kind of neck harness, or body restraint. That’s when I realized what a mistake I had made. After that it had been all about survival.
I could go back and check on Frank and the lady doc, but by the time I looked outside and saw the police vehicle lights, I knew it might be best to just put my head down and pretend like everything was normal, even though the alarms in the building were sounding loud and clear.
I stopped in the locker room, picked up an Abraxin Corporation ball cap, and slapped it on my head. Then I hustled toward the back exit and made for my car. As I puttered away from what was sure to be my former job once Frank reported me to the agency, I thought about my options. It was highly doubtful that I’d be able to keep working for the temp agency, so I’d have to find a new one that wouldn’t ask too many questions. Or do too much of a background check.
Basically, I was screwed. I had given the idea of moving to another state a lot of thought over the last few months, but I still didn’t have the balls, or the finances, to back that up. I could always pack all of my shit into the back of my car and hope to get out of town before I ran out of gas, then stand on the side of the freeway with my dick in my hand and my thumb out, hoping someone would give me a ride out of this shit town.
But that wasn’t going to happen. I still had a bed and I’d get paid a week’s wages in five days, although my plans to get a payday loan to tide me over were now shot. The only thing I could do was head home, listen to my roommate’s ridicule, and then see if he had a little pot left so I could get some sleep.
So that’s what I did.
* * *
I woke up on Saturday morning to a headache, a raging hard-on, and someone pounding on the front door.
There was a Red Bull on the nightstand. I lifted the can, shook it, and took a chance that there wasn’t a cigarette butt inside with the rest of the fluid.
I was wrong.
After fighting the urge to barf, I pulled out another cigarette, lit it, and let the smoke rise toward the ceiling.
More loud banging on the door again. Jesus!
“Mitch. Someone’s at the door for you!” I yelled.
The banging started up again and Mitch, who usually slept in on Saturdays, didn’t answer me, and he certainly didn’t go and answer the door.
“Christ,” I muttered.
I kicked some dirty clothes around until I found a shirt that didn’t look too bad, but it didn’t pass the sniff test. I tossed it into the corner and then rooted around in a dresser drawer and found a button up shirt. I flung it on, slipped on a pair of shorts, and then cracked the bedroom door open and looked around for Mitch and or Mindy.
This time the person hit the door so hard it rattled in its frame.
“Coming, for fucks sake!” I yelled.
I stubbed my toe on the corner of the couch, cursed again, limped the rest of the way, and finally flung open the door. I had feared it would be someone from the agency looking for my ass, or Frank with a wrench to bash in my head. A bill collector, or maybe Roger, our pot dealer, looking to collect some money.
Instead it was the lady doc from the night before.
She looked worse for wear, like she hadn’t slept. She hadn’t changed her clothes, and her starched white lab coat from the night before was anything but. Blood and some green stuff smeared the front. She had some soot on her cheek and her hair, short and straight the night before, looked like it had been used for a bird to hatch a bunch of eggs.
“How in the…” I didn’t get to finish my sentence.
She pushed me back as she looked over her shoulder. Once we were both inside she slammed the door shut.
“You’re an idiot.” She seethed as she brushed past me, looked around the room, wrinkled her nose, and then made for the kitchen. “Do you have any coffee?”
“I’m a what? What are you doing here? No.” I answered her questions in one go.
“I was in the neighborhood and thought I would pop in for tea and biscuits.” She rolled her eyes. “I was looking for you. As I said. You’re an idiot.”
“I’m a what?” I sputtered this time as I followed her into the kitchen.
She dumped the coffee filter and what was probably week-old coffee grounds into the overflowing sink, and then rinsed out the empty pot.
“You have no idea what you’ve done. I’ve tracked you down because I need to find that man, Frank. Then I’m on the first plane back to England.”
“Listen, lady. I don’t even know your name. So quit acting all butt-hurt and tell me why you’re here!” I demanded.
�
��I think I’ve adequately explained myself,” she snapped as she opened cabinet doors, presumably looking for coffee. “My name is Dr. Elizabeth Breeze.”
“Wait.” I chuckled. “Really?”
“You find my name amusing?”
“Yeah. It’s the name of a porn star. How long have you been doing porn, doc?”
Her green eyes narrowed as she pierced me with a stare.
“Coffee’s on top of the fridge,” I offered with a good-natured shrug. “In a big can labeled Folgers.”
I went back to my bedroom and retrieved my cigarette, which somehow hadn’t rolled inside of the Red Bull can, then I came back and flopped down on the couch, an Ikea set whose pillows had gone flat a year ago. When you sat down it was like dropping into a hole dug especially for your butt.
“I wish you wouldn’t smoke,” she said as I lit up a fresh one.
“That makes two of us, but here we are.” I shrugged as she banged around in the kitchen. “You know, it’s kind of nice having a woman in the kitchen. It’s been a while.”
“You’re about to have a woman caving in your skull with a metal spoon if you don’t tell me where to find a coffee filter.”
“Don’t have any. Use a paper towel or a napkin from the top right drawer,” I said and blew smoke at the ceiling.
More drawers banged around for a few seconds. How was I supposed to know where to find Frank Evans? I didn’t even like my manager at work. Did she think that Frank and I had a Dungeons and Dragons group or something? I never should have answered the door. My head still hurt and I wasn’t any closer to finding some Tylenol, mainly because I was stuck in the Ikea couch butt spot of doom.
Last night when I’d returned home, Mitch and his girlfriend had been banging into the wall during some wild and freaky sex. I know Mitch is into some wild stuff and I’m pretty sure he was the one on the receiving end, because Mindy kept shouting, “Who's the naughty monkey!?”
Thank God I wasn’t the naughty monkey.
They had left a Costco-sized plastic bottle of Vodka open on the card table that served as our dining room set. I had picked up a red Solo cup from the kitchen table, rinsed it out, and poured a generous amount of vodka inside before heading to bed.
Now the lady doc with a porn star name was currently in my kitchen making coffee. I don’t know how old the grounds on the refrigerator were and I didn’t care. She was welcome to all of the coffee she wanted. As soon as I got rid of her, I was going to go buy a Red Bull.
“As I was saying, you’re an idiot, and you have no idea what you have unleashed.”
I liked the way her accent lilted at the end as she said ‘idiot.’ “Don’t tell me it’s the zombie apocalypse.”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” she shot back. “I’m a virologist and I can assure you that there is no such thing as zombies.”
“Really? Have you ever seen a bunch of college kids with cell phones in hand, walking down the street?”
“I suppose you’re having a laugh,” Elizabeth said. “You left me in the hallway with a raving lunatic.”
“Frank’s not that bad,” I said and then fought back a grin.
“Very funny,” she said. “Now you had better listen to what I have to say, because things may progress too quickly for us to stay on top of.”
It took every ounce of my being to not crack a joke about a porn star staying on top.
“Look, Elizabeth Breeze, I’m just a simple guy who wasn’t very good at his job, didn’t like going to work, and has no intention of being a scapegoat for whatever scheme you’re trying to hatch.”
The lady doc put her hands on her hips and leaned forward. “The man you let out is on the loose. Your friend Frank is missing. This is not a joke. Have I make myself clear?”
“What do you expect me to do about that? I just told you that I’m not even good at my own job. What makes you think I can even help you? Don’t you have, I don’t know, some kind of fixers or something you can call in? Get this zombie thing sorted out before nightfall. I’m just a guy who wants to nurse a hangover, drink some Red Bull, and have a few smokes while I watch Netflix. I may get baked later, if you want to stick around.”
“Why did I bother?” Elizabeth muttered.
“Good question,” I said and then realized I was being an asshole.
“I’m sorry to have bothered you,” Elizabeth said, and made for the door.
“Wait. Just wait. I need a few minutes,” I said. “My head’s killing me, and it’s making me grumpy. Okay?”
She stopped in the hallway, crossed her arms over her chest, and stared at her feet for a few seconds, then let out a heavy sigh, turned back, and finished making coffee.
* * *
After we had both calmed down a bit, I washed out a couple of coffee mugs as a peace offering and then sat down to hear what she had to say. Mitch and his girlfriend weren’t home, and I had no idea when they would return. I wasn’t too excited to see my roommate because I was already behind on my share of the rent and, to the best of my knowledge, I had just lost my job.
“Wait. You said Frank Evans, head of janitorial services, is missing. Does that mean I’m not fired?” I asked.
“I have no idea but you should really be worried about him, not your job.”
“Easy for you to say. You probably make six-figures. I make six-figures if you count the decimal spaces,” I said. “How did you find me, anyway?”
“I called the employment agency and asked for your address. They were reluctant, but I told them that I was your doctor, and I had been unable to get a hold of you concerning some important tests.”
“That’s just fantastic,” I couldn’t keep my sarcasm out of my voice. “So you tracked me down, now you want to rub all of this in my face, jump on a plane, and fly back to London. I’m not sure I understand anything that’s happening here.”
She put her hands together under her chin and closed her eyes for a minute. Praying?
“I’ll start at the beginning, and I will use small words.”
“Is bitch one of those words?”
She blew out a breath and then her face cracked. She had been all self assured huff and puff, but suddenly she looked like she was about to cry.
“Sorry,” I muttered.
“It’s okay. I’m under a lot of stress and that brings out a nasty streak,” she said.
I looked around and wondered where they had put that jug of vodka. Seemed like it might be a good time for a little hair of the dog in my coffee, and to the best of my knowledge, we didn’t have anything else to drink.
“Why did you guys have that poor man locked up?”
“That’s a story in itself, poor Latimer. But let me explain what it is we do at Abraxin Corp.”
“You test drugs,” I said simply.
“There’s a bit more to it than that. We have a relationship with the CDC that goes beyond simple drug testing. There’s a lot of secrecy and I have to be quite careful with what I share due to the nature of our security clearance. Suffice it to say, we were onto a major breakthrough in Alzheimer's disease, and it had nothing to do with our colleagues at the CDC, not yet, at least. A drug so amazing it could almost immediately begin to restore the lost connections in the human brain. The short version is that there was an accident in the lab and my partner, Albert Copley, was exposed. The effects were terrifying. He lost all sense of his humanity. His eyes glazed over, and a thick mucus began to develop around his eyes.”
“So that’s why you had him locked up? Why wasn’t he in the hospital?”
“That wasn’t Copley. Copley died a few hours after he began exhibiting signs of the virus. Before he passed away he attacked a number of colleagues. Two of them died, but the third, Latimer, developed a different form of the virus. He was faster, stronger, and meaner than he had been before.”
I scratched my head as I considered her words. I could really use some of that booze right about now. Hey, it’s noon somewhere, am I right?
“So, Latimer was the guy in the cage?”
“Yes. And he was quite ill. You freed a subject that shouldn’t be alive, and he certainly should not be around other people.”
“I freed a man.”
“Pardon?”
“You referred to him as a subject. From what I saw he was a man stuck in a cage,” I said. What I didn’t say was that I knew how that felt because I had spent a little bit of time in jail. Once you put four walls around a man and take away his freedom, you’ve taken away everything he is.
“Listen. I’m sure you meant well, but the subject, man, whatever you want to call him, is gone. He’s a mindless beast interested only in one thing. Destruction. He rages inside, and that rage is channeled into an anger so fierce it makes him nearly superhuman.”
“Some Alzheimer cure.” I shook my head.
“We were hacked.”
“What? By Russia?” I laughed.
“We’re not sure. At first we thought the hack came from inside of the U.S. but it may have come from China. They didn’t want to steal from us. They wanted to sow chaos. It was a longshot at best, their manipulation of our formulas, but it worked, and one of us was infected, then three. Do you see how quickly it can spread?”
“So instead of dealing with this, you’re going to run away?”
“I was angry when I said that I was flying back to London. I’m actually here for a different reason.”
“Oh yeah?” I quirked my lips up in a grin.
“Revolting. I’m here to get your help. We need to track down your friend, Frank, and make sure he isn’t infected.”
I sat back in the chair and lit up another cigarette. “I don’t know. I have a pretty full schedule today.”
“I’ll make it worth your while,” she said and reached for her purse.
“Oh yeah?” I quirked my lips in a leering grin one more time just for the hell of it.
She pulled out an envelope and showed me a small stack of twenties. “I’ll pay you $250 dollars for your assistance.”
Dawn of the Rage Apocalypse Page 3
