Zombie Fever: Evolution

by B. M. Hodges

  Jamie’s flat was in the next block. It was twelve flights to their floor. She ran to the door and banged on it with her fist, “Mrs. Chen! Open up!”

  She banged again, and Jamie’s grandmother opened the door.

  “Why, it’s little Abi coming for a visit! My, my. Come in, come in,” the nearly blind, ninety-year-old said, ushering her in with a toothless grin, “Jamie’s not here. She’s filming a television show with her best friend Abigail.”

  Abigail squeezed past the doddering old lady. She spotted Jamie’s ten-year-old brother standing on a stool eating a steamed bun and leaning precariously against an oversized, rickety and wobbly bookshelf filed with knickknacks from surrounding Asian countries, old-fashioned hardcover books, and toys. Ryan was stretching up as far as he could, reaching for a commando robot sitting on the top shelf. “Ryan, where are your parents?”

  He continued reaching as the shelves swayed back and forth. “They went to pick up Jamie. She called awhile ago from the hospital. After the call, they decided it best to get her out of there.”

  “Ryan! Get down from there or you’ll get a time out!” Jamie’s grandmother hollered.

  He grabbed the robot toy, turned to her and asked with innocent eyes, “Abigail, is it true? Are we under attack?”

  “There’s an emergency, yes. Ryan can you show me where your parents keep your passports? I need you and your grandmother to come with me. We’re going to take a little trip.”

  Ryan leaped off the stool like a superhero with a grunt and his grandmother gave him a disapproving scowl as he ran to his parent’s room.

  Abigail followed, watching him dig their passports out of a wooden box in the closet.

  Abigail picked up Ryan’s mobile phone and dialed Gleneagles, but all she got was a disconnect sound. She tried her home phone number and heard nothing but the same.

  “It’s been like that for a while. I’ve been trying to call my parents since they left and can’t get through.” Ryan said.

  Abigail searched through the kitchen drawers and found a pen. She quickly scrolled a note and set it on the table in front of the door for Jamie:

  Jamie,

  Sorry I couldn’t take your parents with me. Hope your parents made it to Gleneagles. I’m taking your grandmother and brother. Once I get them off the island, we’ll figure out what to do next. Stay put and I’ll meet you here. If you’re up to it, we should try to rendezvous with Tomas tonight.

  Be safe.

  Love,

  Abi

  ******

  For a vast majority of Singaporeans, this Saturday night was like any other, except for the inconvenience of disrupted phone and internet service, and the irritating wail of emergency sirens. Between the rumors of violence and rioting in the city area, people were surprisingly slow to realize that they needed to take heed of the government’s warning to get to safety.

  Before they retreated behind their padlocked iron-grills and dead bolted reinforced doors, hungry Singaporeans continued to wait in line for their favorite noodle or curry dish in takeaway restaurants, thinking to themselves, “Wah! The rioting not in my neighborhood, lor! Have plenty of time to get home.”

  And with so many citizens still out on the streets, the infection rate began to escalate and the incubation rate of IHS-2 dropped below fifteen minutes. Those unlucky souls who were traveling in the crowded subways with biters and people succumbing to the fever were now crawling and climbing their way out of the underground into the heartland neighborhoods.

  And it wasn’t helping that dusk was settling over the land. In less than half an hour, darkness would begin to conceal the extent zombie fever was spreading across the island.

  ******

  The ride to Changi International Airport was more or less without incident. Abigail took advantage of the less busy side streets and soon they were closing in on the airport.

  But her mother wouldn’t stop asking questions: “What is going on, Abi? Where are we supposed to go? I need to get hold of Faris before we leave. What will your stepfather think when he comes home to an abandoned house?”

  Abigail did her best to ease her mother’s fears; but she didn’t want to frighten the children in the ca,r so she didn’t mention the contagion.

  “Mother, there’s fighting in the streets and people are saying that it could be civil unrest. I want you all to be away until it’s over. When I’m assured you’re all safely off the island, I’m going back to get Jamie and her parents and I’ll be sure to check for Faris and bring him along, I promise. Right now, you need to focus on the kids and Grandma Lily. They’re going to be depending on you to get them to your destination. Focus your energy on them, okay?”

  But her mother could tell that Abigail wasn’t telling the whole truth so she continued to pepper Abigail with questions.

  Changi International Airport and the Tanah Merah Ferry Terminal were located beside on another on the eastern tip of the island. Initially, Abigail’s plan was to take her family and Jamie’s and put them on a flight to Australia or New Zealand. But as the airport came into view, that plan was proved impossible. Military personnel were sealing off the airport road ahead.

  If the military is shutting down the airport, the ferry terminal is bound to be next, she thought.

  Abigail jerked the wheel, taking the sedan onto a tiny service road that encircled the airport and the Tanah Merah Ferry Terminal. If she hadn’t been driving a police vehicle with flashing lights, the military servicemen setting up the barricade may have come after her. But they shrugged it off as official business and continued with their duties.

  The service road soon became two muddy tire ruts in the high jungle grass next to an irrigation canal. The sedan’s tires began sliding around as the slick mud became thick and greasy. Abigail struggled to keep the car out of the canal, but it was difficult because it drifted towards the edge whenever she gave the engine more gas. And it didn’t help that her sisters would scream whenever the car began to slide. But slowing down wasn’t an option: if they got stuck in the rain forest between the airport and the ferry terminal, they would have to deal with venomous snakes, monitor lizards, humungous spiders and wild boars inhabiting the untamed sliver of wilderness.

  Abigail’s fears dissipated when the Ferry Terminal materialized across an open field. She stopped the car, took the keys out of the ignition and unlocked the shotgun attached to the center console. With the gun and the swag bag full of prize money in hand, she helped Grandma Lily out of the car while her mother gathered the children.

  It was dusk and the purple sky offered barely enough light to see two steps ahead.

  Abigail eased Grandma Lily down the slope of the service road embankment and, with her mother and the children following, they made their way through the field of high razor grass to the terminal. A couple times Abigail felt the slither of something cold and slimy caress her bare legs, and they had to stop until she got the nerve to continue.

  Mentally, she was kicking herself for not digging the reality show’s bio-suit out of the trash bin in her room. She had been so careless about tossing it in there the night before. That suit had been specially made to protect against bites, human or otherwise, and she was sure the thick leathery rubber would have prevented any potential cobra fangs from giving her the kiss of death in the field.

  Fortunately, there were no snake bites, and they punched their way through the grass to the parking lot of the Terminal and the mass of humanity struggling to get onto one of the remaining ferries.

  Hundreds of panicked Singaporeans sensing the scale of the upcoming catastrophe, pushed and shoved their way into the terminal, overwhelming the few elderly security guards who wisely stood out of the way of the mob. Singapore has one of the best-educated populations in the world. But it didn’t take a PhD to put together the rioting violence and the recent outbreak of zombie fever in neighboring Malaysia to realize that they were connected. Many of them caught on that there was an imminent calamity about to
overtake their country. Regardless of the differences between the zombie outbreaks of the past and the current state of affairs, it wasn’t difficult to make the link between the two events.

  Taking Grandma Lily’s hand and toting the shotgun in the other, Abigail circled along the outskirts of the lot, looking for an alternate way to the ferry dock. There was a high chain-link fence surrounding the waterfront. She spotted a locked gate that had been overlooked by the crowd of refugees.

  Abigail made sure her family was safely behind her, aimed at the locking mechanism, closed her eyes and fired the shotgun. When she opened her eyes, the lock was in pieces and the gate was open.

  After they got through, with the help of her mother and sisters, Abigail slid a couple of barrels against the gate to buy some time in the event the crowds out front found the opening and came rushing through.

  Grandma Lily watched as they worked, and she clapped her hands encouragingly in the light of the moon rising off the water.

  By the time they climbed onto the dock and traversed the hundred yards to the end, one of the remaining two ferries had already pulled away and the plank to the other was pushed into the water.

  “Hey!” Abigail shouted. “Wait!”

  “Sorry, sorry, Miss, ferry’s full. Cannot allow more on, lah. Pei sei, pei sei,” the ferry captain replied, loosening ropes that held the ferry against the decking. It was an ancient ferry from the old family-run fleets. It was small, with a capacity of eighty passengers and crew which consisted of the captain and one or two deckhands. But it was apparent from the derelict condition of the ferry and the captain doing the manual labor that he was the only crew handling the boat.

  Abigail reached into the swag bag and pulled out a handful of bills and again shouted, “Hey!”

  The ferry captain glanced up and his eyes locked onto the money, “How much you have there?” Greed took over, “It’s twenty-five thousand for each passenger.”

  Twenty-five thousand dollars for a ferry ticket that would normally cost forty. But it was her family - and in those ticking seconds closing in on disaster, it didn’t sound all that unreasonable to Abigail.

  “I have a hundred thousand in this bag. I’ll give it all to you if you take these five. Three are children and don’t take up much room. Can?”

  Without another word, the ferry captain helped them onboard and snatched the bag of money.

  Abigail hugged them all before passing them across to the boat, but she hugged her little sisters the tightest. “Come with us, Abi, come with us!” she bawled.

  She helped Grandma Lily up to the deck and shook Ryan’s hand firmly. “Take care of them,” she told him.

  The ferry pulled away.

  Abigail wiped away her tears and made her way, once again, through the grassy field full of slithery and slimy things to the awaiting police car.

  She climbed inside and was about to drive away when something on the radio caught her attention. She turned up the volume and recognized the soothing voice of Singapore Prime Minister Cheung, the most beloved leader they had had since the days of the original Lee dynasty:

  “… not to go outside. Our military and police forces are now gaining the upper hand over the terrorists and antigovernment anarchists attacking our beautiful landmarks in Orchard. We ask that you seek shelter in your flats until further notice. Do not be tempted to seek out family members. Stay indoors until told otherwise. Do not believe the rumors that the zombie fever plague has spread into Singapore. The violence and rioting are the work of terrorists working with foreign allies. Martial law has been imposed as well as an island wide curfew. Your safety cannot be guaranteed if you are outdoors. Remember fellow countrymen: We are strong. We are Singaporeans. We will stay the course, and Singapore will come out of this on top.”

  Abigail couldn’t believe it. Either they don’t know about the new strain of contagion seeding the violence and destruction, or they’re attempting to cover it up. If they don’t tell their citizens about those lunatic zombies, more people will be bitten and more people will succumb until the entire island is nothing but zombie land.

  As she drove back towards Bishan, it became evident that either her Prime Minister was either lying about getting the “upper hand” or wasn’t aware of the extent of the turmoil. No longer localized in the downtown district, the contagion was spreading quickly across the island. The quiet streets on the drive to the ferry terminal not more than a half hour earlier had been the calm before the storm. Those without the good sense to remain locked behind their iron-gated doors had poured into the streets, some searching for their loved ones in the growing din of violence and calamity, others taking advantage of the pandemonium - looting, robbing and assaulting their fellow countrymen; and the infected chewing their way through the undulating flesh spilling onto the boulevards.

  Singapore was falling into total anarchy.

  As she sped back towards Jamie’s flat, swerving around hysterical and terrorized people in the streets as they ran from once-friendly neighbors intent on eating their flesh and armies of angry citizens battling each other with rocks and wooden poles. She barely escaped a rather fierce group of rioters jumping up and down on an overturned military Jeep, celebrating the destruction. When they saw her approaching police car, they turned their hatred on her and began pelting it with bricks and pipes taken from a nearby construction site.

  Abigail stopped on a deserted road to catch her breath. She felt a sense of hopelessness and was momentarily overcome with despair as she watched two men yank a woman to the ground and tear into her soft belly with their teeth and digging fingers. As soon as the woman stopped squirming, the two infected men stood and started scanning the area for another victim.

  Abigail’s rage boiled over. This isn’t how this day was supposed to turn out. Jamie and I were supposed to win the million-dollar prize and were supposed to be dining at the finest seafood restaurant atop the Ion celebrating our victory and global fame as heroines fighting the zombie menace.

  She let out a war cry, put the car into gear and floored it, smashing into the two infected. The police car rolled into them, but Abigail hadn’t thought through the consequences of striking two fully grown me. The taller of the two careened off the bumper and rolled up on to the hood, striking the windshield, his weight pushing the glass inward in a cocoon of safety glass as it caved into the car’s interior. She hit the brakes, hoping to dislodge the man, but he remained stuck.

  The police sedan was now impossible to drive.

  Abigail had to do something fast before the mob turned on her or an infected took an interest in her succulent flesh. There was no choice. She grabbed the shotgun and began jogging towards Jamie’s apartment still two miles ahead.

  It wasn’t long before the shotgun in her hand attracted the attention of other silent refugees threading their way through the crowds towards their own destinations. Soon three, then four others were jogging along behind her as if pulled by her wake, hoping that she could protect them with her weapon in the event they were attacked.

  But their little jogging party began to draw the attention of zombies dining around them, attracted by the steady stream of movement. Soon the joggers were being plucked away, one at a time, from zombies sprinting up and pouncing from behind.

  “Use your gun!” the last of Abigail’s followers cried as he was swarmed by four ravenous infected.

  Abigail wasn’t about to start firing the shotgun and draw more attention. She had to get to the apartment and help her best friend. By now, she was sure Jamie and her parents had made it back to their flat. She had to find her and escape Singapore. Meeting up with Tomas no longer an option.

  The street lights and the lights in the buildings began flickering and the crowds screamed in terror. Then the lights across the entire island dimmed and went out, plunging everything - the avenues, office building, hotels, blocks of apartments and shopping centers - into darkness. The swarms of people in the streets began to scatter, those Singapo
reans once boldly searching for their families or trying to take advantage of the chaos for personal gain now running for shelter.