Seven Days Dead

by Christopher Johnson

  5 seconds.

  They were within a few feet of him now, and Tal closed his eyes, ducking behind the low wall that separated the Mamilla Cemetery from Bush Square, and waited.

  Right about now.

  Though he couldn’t hear it, the cooking timer gave its last little ding and, upon contact, ignited the steel wool. The oil went up in a flash, a small pop coming from the bottle as the flames burst the plastic. And then a rush of noise that lasted only a second to Tal, because his

  eardrums were shocked by the concussion of the gas line exploding before giving up sound in favor of a single persistent tone. Bodies flew everywhere and car alarms began to blare, though to Tal they sounded like they were wrapped in cotton. Those of the creatures that weren't caught in the explosion turned to face the sound and the fire. Some few had been set ablaze by the explosion and carried on walking anyway, but all of those left in the street went toward the now burning barbeque restaurant. Tal shook his head to clear the daze from the blast's concussion and jumped the low wall.

  Never waste an opportunity.

  Chapter Three

  Running past the mob of creatures gathering to watch the burning barbeque restaurant was relatively easy. The sound of the explosion and the car alarms had done their job, though honestly the alarms were an extra he hadn't expected, and the combination of noise and light drew them toward the source like moths. Tal risked a quick sideways glance as he moved past in order to gauge the possibility of pursuit, and was taken aback a little at the carnage. Both lying on the ground, and still walking. A few of the beasts were aflame, apparently not the least concerned, and the fire's light glinted off shards of glass from the building's windows embedded in a multitude of faces, necks, and other areas.

  What the hell is wrong with these people , he thought, that they don't feel such wounds? And the eating people, of course, can't forget about how fucked up that is.

  As he darted across the corner and on to Queen Shlomziyon Street, he tried to think of what could be the cause of all this.

  Maybe it's some souped-up form of rabies? Their minds are so gone they're like animals?

  He'd seen a rabid dog before, once. Poor thing was so screwed up it was biting itself hard enough to draw blood, growling at everything and running into walls. But the wounds. Some of those monsters should have been down long ago, bled out or something. Tal ran toward Uzi Khason Street, knowing he'd just have a few rows of steps to run up, then past Koresh Street and on to Shoshan, where hopefully the trucks were still parked. As he came up to the corner, he slowed and pressed up against the wall of a small book store.

  Never turn a corner at a run, unless you want to get shot, he thought.

  Though being shot was the least horrific option available at the moment. He took a quick look around the corner, ducked back, and let out a long slow breath. There was no movement as far as he could see, but there were plenty of bodies. There must have been no shortage of corpses on the run over here, but he'd been focused; he had one mission - survive. Plus, if he was fair, corpses weren't as much of a novelty to him anymore. Not after all his work. But in this case, relatively quiet but for the low sound of those wheezing moans and the crackle of fire a few hundred yards behind him, you couldn't but notice the dozen or so dead people strewn up the stairs.

  Lying on the ground and up the steps were members of every people who called Jerusalem home. Muslim women lay next to Christian men who had fallen near Jews; all equal, all peaceful, all of one nation - dead. Wounds made by teeth and fingers marred their faces and bodies, and blood stained the steps all the way up the street above. There was something hauntingly sad about the scene.

  Death, the Great Equalizer, Tal thought to himself, before jogging toward the steps.

  There were three sets of steps, each terminating at a wide landing before becoming the next flight, and he almost made it to the top.

  Just as he was clearing the second to last step, a hand darted out and gripped his ankle, almost causing Tal to fall. That awful wheezing growl assailed his ears once more, and Tal looked down to see a young Muslim girl, her face covered in a hijab of fine black cloth, the only thing visible was her eyes, shot through with burst blood vessels. She pulled at Tal's ankle, trying to raise her face to his calf, but her lower half wouldn't move.

  The black of her garments had hidden the damage done to her midsection by the creatures, and when she pulled on him, a sound like fresh meat tearing apart heralded the separation of the girl's upper and lower halves. Tal jerked back, trying to dislodge his leg, but her grip was iron and he only succeeded in dragging her further over the top step, her entrails leaving a bloody path behind her.

  "Shit!", he yelled as he fired a panicked shot that buried itself pointlessly into her shoulder.

  13.

  The second shot bored into her skull and out the back, the howl silenced for good.

  12.

  Tal took a shaky breath and reached down to pry her fingers from his ankle.

  "Shit." At the bottom of the stairs were four of the creatures, staring up at Tal with blank faces and blood-black eyes, a grim collection of wounds and gashes.

  They must have heard the shots, or me yelling. Way to fuck up noise discipline, genius.

  As one, four mouths opened and that sound issued forth, and Tal turned and bolted for the intersection behind him. Hopefully they would have trouble with the stairs, but chances were awful fickle about who they favored so Tal ran as fast as he could straight across Koresh, this time not even bothering to see if there were any more of them, and turned onto Shoshan - right into a roadblock.

  A hasty barricade had been made of broken wood and dumpsters, and there were about five of the City's police, and three soldiers were guarding it. Had Tal been a little slower to fall to the street, the bullet fired by the young Israeli officer at the front of the blockade would have ended up in Tal's forehead instead of the wall behind him.

  "Fuck! Fuck, man! Don't shoot! I'm not one of them!" Tal yelled, holding up his hand and letting the Jericho hang from his finger by the guard.

  "Hold your fire! Hold your fire! Get him! Drag his ass behind this shit!", a voice came from behind the now eight armed people pointing firearms at Tal's prone form, and a young captain pushed forward and placed a hand on two of the sentries; three bars on his epaulettes the only ornament on his olive drab uniform. The two sentries, one an older enlisted man and the other a young woman, moved from behind the waist high detritus to grab Tal by his arms and pull him to his feet and then quickly behind the barricade.

  "Who are you? What the hell are you doing here?" the young captain demanded.

  "Barzani, Tal Barzani. What the hell do you think I'm trying to do? I'm trying to live!", he shot back, before realizing these were the first real people he'd seen and talked to in a very long time.

  "Seren…Levi", Tal addressed the man by his rank and noted the name tape on his chest, "what the hell is going on? What is this shit? Some kind of weird riot or attack?"

  "Where the hell have you been? Under a rock?" Close, bottom of a bottle. "Everything's gone to hell, we've been in the City Hall barricaded up in there for the last two days. There were civilians in there and we blocked the place up when we saw those things from the street. Waited for this crap to get sorted by the rest of the forces, but when we saw the fires…well, that ain't happening now."

  Two days…crap…this is bad.

  "Look, I've been…indisposed…for a while. Fill me in." he said to the captain, hoping that there was some info he could get that might help him live a little longer.

  "Don’t know everything. People were getting sick, just a few, then a lot. Some weird shit was happening around the City, out in the desert. We were called to start patrolling the streets, and everyone suddenly started

  panicking and emptied out the outskirts, headed for the city center. Then these…people…started attacking us screaming some messed up scream and eating other people. I lost ten soldiers…in a bad way.
They don't go down. Mowed into a freaking group of 'em with the MTAR 21's and it didn't do shit. We saw these folks", Levi pointed behind him to a small group of four people, "and we needed cover, so we holed up there, but it just went from bad to worse. Now we're here, trying to get out before the fires take it all."

  Well, that explains why I didn't see more people on the way here, thought Tal, they thought they'd be safer the farther in the City they went. Wonder if it worked…though I doubt it, probably just put all the…food…in one place.

  "Look, I shot a couple of them in the head, which seemed to put them down. But you're right, the City is done, and we have to get out. There used to be trucks and shit here, we need to get in one and head to the desert, where we'll have the tactical advantage. Too close quarters here, and the fires, we'll be ambushed if we don’t burn to death first." Hopefully, the young captain had been in long enough to know that combat in an urban situation, especially one with raging fires, was a huge mistake.

  "Where the hell are we going to go in the desert? Didn't you hear me? Some of this shit had to come from there! We don't have anything to survive out there!", Levi yelled, clearly thinking Tal's plan was foolish.

  "Trust me, I know a place. But we have to move now, some of those things were on my six right before I found you. If they don't find us, others will!" This conversation was clearly not going to end in mutual acceptance, but Tal knew that the open terrain of the desert was the only option for survival, and he had a few tricks up his sleeve besides.

  "No…fuck that. We are soldiers and we are gonna fight our way to a military post. Everyone went toward City Center, and we will too. Get on board or get the fuck back out there if you want. We're getting a vehicle and heading in. The other side of the street is blocked by a car, so if you wanna help, figure out how to get that out of my way."

  "Goddamnit Levi! Listen, I saw a chopper on my way here! They were flying OUT of the City! Whatever was happening where they flew from, it was clearly not good!" he shouted, hoping sense would somehow be drilled into this man's brain. But all argument was stalled as the female solder called out.

  "Seren Levi! I can hear them! We're gonna have contact real soon!" The two sentries double checked their weapons, and moved a couple fragmentation grenades to their chest straps for better access.

  "Alright! Hold your fire, until absolutely necessary!" Looking at Tal with grudging doubt, "shoot for the head if you can! Officers! Take up positions behind my folks! The rest of you, move to the rear and try and find something we can use to get to the City's center!"

  A few of the City police drew their pistols and moved behind the soldiers, ready to fire if the creatures managed to break through. Tal clenched his fists at the stubborn stupidity of the rash young captain, but moved toward the middle of the street. Huddled down together was a young couple, a man in his mid forties and by the looks of it his teenage daughter.

  Shit, these people are dinner with this asshole in charge.

  He looked around the alley to see what he could use and, like a gift from God, his eyes landed on a white delivery truck, the back hatches opened and the bed empty. For the first time in a long time, Tal looked skyward and said a heartfelt thank you.

  "Alright! Up, everyone up! Get to that truck, we are going to get the hell out of here." Tal clapped his hands and motioned the people to follow him as he walked toward the truck. Though honestly, if you had asked him afterward, he’d have been unable to explain why he cared about the others.

  "What about Seren Levi? The soldiers?" the older man spoke up.

  He was sitting on the street, back up against a wall with his daughter held

  protectively against his side, his yarmulke slightly skewed and grime on his face. The girl was shaking, wide eyed, and at Tal's insistence to move, she looked like she was about to start crying.

  "I'm sure they'll be along presently" Tal absentmindedly said.

  In truth, he couldn’t care less about the man, stupidity was nature's way of weeding out some people, and he was busy looking at the crashed car blocking the other end of Shoshan street; well more accurately the alley way to Yafo, Shoshan's other end was a wall.

  Actually a pretty good position to take up in a normal instance, but this isn't normal, is it Levi?

  It wasn't in there far, really just the front end was in the alley and most of the car was sticking out into Yafo. Enough to make the monsters shuffle by, but less of a problem then he'd thought. All he'd really have to do was…..

  "Contact front!" one of the soldier's at the barricade called out, and began to fire, the staccato pop pop of the bull pup rifles on semi auto echoing off the walls.

  Motivated by the sudden sound of gunfire, the group jumped up and ran to the open truck and everyone scrambled into the back.

  No, don't worry, I'll drive, he thought with a huff.

  Tal turned to see a group of around ten or so of the creatures trying to push through the gunfire and attack the soldiers trying to hold them at bay. Immediately, one of the policemen broke and ran, tearing off all the way to the end of the street and scrabbling over the wall, without even drawing his side arm.

  Best of luck, thought Tal, not begrudging the man his cowardice. Not everyone was a fighter, after all.

  The firing was doing little to stop the creatures, the soldiers apparently ignoring the head shot suggestion, some of the creatures falling over from the impact but getting back up in short order. In between the shots, Tal could hear that damned wailing sound and he knew that sooner or later if there were any more of the things in the area, those wails and the gunfire would be like ringing a dinner bell. One or two of the creatures went down, a lucky mistaken headshot bringing them to the street, but in short order their numbers began to overwhelm the defenders. The police were firing into the mass, and despite the occasional lethal hit, the beasts weren't slowing. A few more creatures could be seen appearing from the side streets and they quickly joined the pack assaulting the flimsy barricade.

  Lightning quick, one of the creatures snaked out an arm and grabbed the older soldier by his uniform, dragging him close. The man, to his credit, tried to punch the thing in the head as he continued firing into the crowd. The creature showed no hint of even registering the punch and simply pulled the soldier in, close as lovers, and tore out his throat with its teeth. The female soldier screamed at seeing her compatriot being feasted upon, and drew her pistol from its holster on her side. She aimed right into the creature's face, pulling the trigger again and again as she yelled her own war cry, the rifle in her other hand still writing crimson characters across the chests of the other beasts.

  "Levi! Fall back, you can't hold them!" Tal yelled as he backed toward the truck.

  "Get them out! I'll buy you some ti…" The rest of the captain's words were lost in a rush of noise and fire. Several of the creatures had managed to subdue the soldier despite her ferocious resistance, and as they were clawing at her, ripped loose the pin from one of her grenades. The concussion knocked many of the creatures to the ground; the immediate few devouring the soldier were ripped to pieces, pink mist beginning to settle on the alley. A piece of the barricade had blown backwards and hit the captain in the back of his head mid sentence, blood leaking out of his left ear. Tal was dazed at the second concussion of the morning, but once more his training saved him and muscle memory took over. He picked himself up off the street and stumbled forward, forgetting to grab the captain's rifle which had been knocked off his shoulder from the blast, and hoisting the man over his own shoulder, ran to the back of the truck before he had even realized he'd done it. Ears ringing, again, he tossed the captain in the back and closed one of the doors, before tossing his pistol to the young man sitting next to his wife.

  "You know how to use this?" he yelled.

  "I..I..think so." He stuttered back, clearly having never held a weapon before in his life, the wide eyed gaze of his wife not instilling Tal with confidence.

  "Better learn real fucking quick
! Point, pull the trigger. Don't waste the ammo! Only if you have to, and aim for the head! The head, you hear?" Tal barely waited for the man to nod before heading to the driver's side of the truck's cab.

  Tal climbed into the seat and searched for keys, finding none. Ripping open the plastic dash below the wheel he found the appropriate wires, just as the creatures recovered their feet and began shuffling down the alley toward the truck. He struck the wires together, once, twice, sparks flying at each contact. On the third strike, the engine roared to life and Tal twisted the wires together. He backed the truck up to face the car blocking in the alley and threw it into drive, praying the car was not wedged in more than it looked. Flooring the pedal, the truck lurched forward, and Tal ground the gears getting it into second. Damn double clutch! The truck picked up speed and hit the car at about ten miles an hour, the impact jarring Tal's teeth and sending his cargo sliding towards the front of the truck. But the car moved and rolled backwards and to the right into Yafo street, leaving left as the only direction open to Tal.

  Picking up speed, and getting better with the double clutch, he moved at a semi cautious speed up Yafo and down another alley to the right. The last thing he needed was to crash and have to hoof it out of the City, or miss a turn. He just had to get around the tunnel and then he would be clear to head toward the desert. Thankfully, the desert this close to the City was mostly hard packed scrabble, not the rolling dunes of the deep desert, but depending on what he found when he got to his destination, the deep desert wasn't ruled out as an option. There were oases out there, maps with every tactical position in the area stored in his mind.

  More or less anyway.

  He drove down past Safra Square and into a residential area. Every so often, a figure would move out from a side street and into the path of the truck, and Tal ran them over further abusing the front bumper. As an afterthought, he hoped none of them were…normal. Finally he reached Ha Nevi'im Street and turned toward the Old City, having gone far enough that he'd be on the other side of the tunnel. True to the captain's word, the closer he got to the outskirts of the City, the sparser the bodies in the streets and the fewer wrecked or abandoned cars he saw.