Dead Pulse Rising: A Zombie Novel

by K. Michael Gibson

  I turned to face the movement when my world exploded in flashes of light and pain. I heard the muffled sound of laughter as I dropped to the forest floor, and in my scrambled thoughts, I heard something else as well.

  “I told you, you were mine, bitch,” a deep voice rumbled.

  My eyes blurred and rolled into the back of my head, and I fell into unconsciousness.

  ****

  When I awoke, I could see through my swollen eyes that I was sitting in my parents’ dining room area. Pain throbbed in my head, and I winced as I tried to raise my hands up to my face. This became a problem when I realized that my arms had been bound behind the back of the chair that I was sitting in. I looked down—my feet had been secured as well. From the looks of it, heavy layers of duct tape had been wrapped around each ankle several times, creating an unmoving bond to the chair legs. I raised my head in an effort to observe my surroundings. My neck ached and popped as I lifted it upward.

  A darkened figure sat across the room from me, staring at me intently with cold blue-gray eyes. He leaned forward in my mother’s rocking chair and rested his arms on his lap. He tapped his fingertips to his chin, and spoke, “Welcome back, Mr. Walker,” came a vaguely familiar voice. “I was wondering for a little bit if my friend over there had hit you too hard.” The figure clapped his hands together. “Ha, you must have really pissed him off back there.”

  The man in front of me chuckled as I noticed a massive black man step out from behind me, holding an MP5 leveled at my chest.

  “It’s all good, Cap. We’re even now.” The large man smiled and gazed down at me with narrowed eyes.

  “What the hell do you people want from me?” I asked in confusion, glancing around the room. It was then I noticed the pair of legs sticking out from behind an island that separated the dining room from the kitchen. I could clearly see the short stubby legs of my father protruding from behind the bar. A small amount of blood stained his pants and soaked into the floor. I jerked upright in my chair, trying to free myself to no avail. “What the hell have you done to him, and where are my mother and my wife?” I screamed in the direction of the two men.

  The man in front of me stared back at me with a hardened look and grinned. “No worries, Mr. Walker, they’re alive. Your father over there is alive . . . for the moment anyway. Consider it an incentive for your cooperation to our proposal.” He paused, choosing his words. “I’ve been reading your service record, Mr. Walker. It was actually funny when I mentioned it to your wife. You should have seen her face when I told her you were a soldier.” He shook his head. “It must have been hard keeping it from her for all of these years.” He stood and began to pace the length of the dining room.

  “You still haven’t told me what the hell it is you want. Is it this stupid file? Don’t tell me you did all this for a fucking piece of paper,” I spat vehemently at the man.

  The captain paused in front of me. “Originally, yes, the files that you were transporting were our primary objective. We were under orders to retrieve the information and deliver them directly to the CDC in order to combat this disease,” he said in a flat tone.

  “More like cover your own asses,” I said incredulously.

  Alex Bishop smiled. “You’re a smart man, Mr. Walker. Your file was correct. Yes, we needed to naturally put some distance between ourselves and any connection to this outbreak. Unfortunately, the American people at large are a bunch of morons. When this gets cleared up, and it will get cleared up, the first thing the public is going to do is demand blood from whoever is responsible. Granted, we didn’t cause this outbreak; our enemies saw to that. It was just dumb luck that as soon as we started our investigations, they struck, and therein lays the problem. If the public were to figure out that we had any prior information to this attack, whether or not if it was a day or ten years, they’re going to demand a reason as to why we hadn’t acted sooner. Unfortunately, this particular administration would most likely agree with them. My department would be finished, and in all honesty for all of our flaws, we do a hell of a lot more good than bad,” he said pacing once more.

  “That’s a great story, sir, but it still doesn’t explain what the hell you want with me.” I shot daggers at him with my eyes.

  Bishop nodded and turned to stare out of the back window. “The President has declared a state of national emergency. Apparently, this particular attack struck us at every major transportation hub across the country. Airports, train stations—hell—even bus depots, so this contagion has spread much, much further than any of us could have even imagined. Naturally, martial law has been put into effect across the entire nation. Problem with that is now my division’s movements are limited. You, however, are not.” Alex paused. “Homeland has been ordered to investigate the cause of this outbreak and backup the National Guard units being deployed across the country. So, needless to say, we’re going to be pretty fucking busy. You, however, are not, plus you have a unique skill set and position that we find to be extremely useful to us in this situation.”

  I shook my head and shrugged.

  Bishop ignored the expression and continued. “There are six cases in total, Mr. Walker, one of them you know of. We didn’t find it on you, so we assume you stashed it somewhere. The others are spread out across the East Coast, each one being carried by a similar armored security group such as yours. Unfortunately, after things began to spread, we lost track of most of those cases, and well, being you yourself are familiar with that industry gives you an edge we do not have.”

  Bishop watched me as things began to form in my mind.

  “And in light of our circumstances, you can understand why we need this done off the books. Something from what I have read of your past seems to be your specialty.” Bishop smiled, half turning in my direction.

  “So . . . what? You think I’m just going to mosey on out and be your errand boy?” I said sarcastically.

  Bishop snickered. “We’re not giving you a choice, Kyle. Your wife and mother, along with the children we found them with, have all been transported to an underground facility not far from here. They’re safe for the moment, but mark my words, if you don’t play ball, I will personally feed each one of them to these crazy bastards walking around out here. Then I’ll drag them back inside and let our eggheads go to town dissecting them.” Bishop stared at me intently. “Consider yourself reactivated, Mr. Walker.”

  I gritted my teeth in disgust. I wanted nothing more but to jump out of this seat and tear the man’s head off with my bare hands, but the asshole had me, and there wasn’t a goddamn thing I could do about it.

  Bishop walked over toward me and set something down on the dining room table.

  I peered at it with suspicion.

  He smiled. “This is a satellite phone. Make certain you don’t lose it. If we manage to find any information that will help you locate the remaining cases, we’ll communicate with you via this. You will also, in turn, give us regular status reports with it as well. We’ll also keep you posted about your family’s well-being, and hell, if you’re a good boy, we may even let you talk to your wife from time to time.” Next, Bishop set my knife on the table as well, having removed it from my duty rig while I was unconscious. “We’ve locked you weapons down in the basement as well. I have a feeling you’re going to need them.” Bishop turned and began to walk out of the room, apparently finished with this conversation.

  I swiveled my head in his direction. “Bishop!” I called out as he began to disappear around the corner into the hallway.

  The man paused and looked over his shoulder at me.

  “I’m going to kill you for this,” I said solemnly.

  Bishop cocked a half grin. “Not today, son,” and with that, he and his partner headed for the front door. “Don’t worry, kid. We’ll lock up on our way out.”

  As I sat there strapped down to the chair, I heard the door slam as they left the house. I cursed and struggled frantically with my bonds, flexing and relaxing my muscles,
trying to break free, the chair hopping around, knocking on the hardwood floors as I moved. I screamed in frustration as I heard an engine start up and pull away outside. I let my arms sag in place, the fight draining out of me, and leaving me with a sense of helplessness. I broke down and began to sob, and then went into full-out wailing. I cursed and swore and finally relented. I sat there bound to the chair in silence. The only sound I heard was an antique coo-coo clock that resided in the living room; its constant ticking reminding me now that time was something we had very little of.

  The End

  Read on for a free sample of Convoy 19

  Prologue

  How did we get here?

  That is a simple question with too many answers. I’ve been staring at it on my computer monitor for hours, wondering where to begin. My house is very quiet without Melissa and Ruben. It’s difficult to stay focused, and I haven’t slept in days.

  It’s a blessing that television and radio have stopped broadcasting. The day-to-day carnage and slaughter that had been dumped into everyone’s houses for months was bad enough, and those horrifying images bear no small level of responsibility for the panic and paranoia that pushed us over the edge. But the talking heads: the pontificating blowhards, raging wall-bangers, and self-righteous assholes that drowned out anyone with a real solution in the pursuit of ratings… that was just too much.

  That’s probably not a good place to start. The failure of media to inform the public is a piece of the puzzle, but it isn’t the biggest piece. Their biased finger pointing and brinkmanship helped to drive the political climate, but our leaders still had the ability to make the right choices. Only they didn’t.

  How did we get here? This is a country with enough guns to arm every man, woman, and child. The United States military budget is larger than every other country combined. How is it that the dead not only rose from the grave to attack the living, but we also failed to manage that horror to the point that it got the better of us? This is a country that survived small pox, cholera, World War Two…how the living hell did we get here?

  The dead rose from the grave to attack the living…that’s the first time I’ve written those words. You’d think that the Secretary of Health and Human Services to the President of the United States of America would have a clear and honest grasp of this crisis, but my staff and I, went to astounding lengths to obfuscate it behind politically correct jargon that had been thoroughly watered down and sanitized for public consumption. “Dissociative Psychotic Fugue”, “Antisocial Analgesia”, “Neurotic Cannibalistic Syndrome”, “Infectious Cotard Disorder.” These are just a few of the ridiculous euphemisms that served no purpose beyond lying to ourselves about what was really happening.

  Of course, even we didn’t understand that we were dealing with the living dead initially. Now, months into this disaster, it’s pretty damn clear to everyone. Yet, this is the first time I’ve directly addressed it. Reminds me of what a bunch of dumb cattle we (not just myself, but everyone else who’s supposed to be in charge) really are.

  Maybe that’s a good place to start: government. The government failed in so many ways that it’s absurd. I could write a book about it, and it would be equal parts tragedy and comedy.

  Let’s start with me. I have a Bachelor of Arts in Business Administration from the University of Texas. What the hell am I doing as Secretary of Health and Human Services? I’ll tell you – I rubbed elbows with a lot of people in the administration’s campaign. I don’t have any real skeletons in my closet and I was rewarded. Jobs were rewarded not for skill or merit, but for political cronyism. Of the ten HHS districts, not one of my directors is a medical doctor, psychologist, or sociologist. They are business people and lawyers. They are men and women who knew the right people and could navigate their way around an office, but when it came to solving real health epidemics or addressing social issues, they may as well have been walking corpses themselves. I never realized there was anything wrong with that…until now. That was simply how the world was run. Brilliant guys like Dr. Henry Damico who had the talent but no connections…they had mid-level desk jobs writing reports to dumb-asses like me…who couldn’t even understand them with a translator.

  So, when shit got real, and it was time for HHS to mobilize…there wasn’t any leadership. I take responsibility for that. If you were building a bonfire to burn down the world, a lot of those logs would have my name on them.

  I’d be in good company, though. I honestly watched the Secretary of State once ask for demographics on the infected, so that he could determine whether Republicans or Democrats were being hit disproportionately in order to prioritize relief. He literally wanted what few semi-competent staff members he had on hand to stop what they were doing so he could--in essence--allow opposing voters to die while giving aid to supporters. I’ll never forget the President’s response: “That’s a really good idea. That’s a really goddamn good idea.”

  About a month ago, I watched a frustrated General try to explain to the Secretary of Defense that the living dead could only be killed by destroying their brain. We were months into this shit-storm and the guy who was managing our rapidly diminishing military resources didn’t even understand how to kill the enemy. The last time I saw him, he was running to his car. When I asked his personal aide what was going on, she said that the marine platoon he had delegated to guard his family’s neighborhood had gone AWOL.

  When refugees started flooding in from every corner of the globe under the false assumption that America would manage the crisis better than their home nations, Homeland Security was still looking for terrorists. Plane-loads of Asian and European infected were just pouring into our airports, but as long as they weren’t on the terror list…they were welcomed in with open arms. Months into the shit, when the President finally asked if it would be a good idea to screen air travelers, the Director of Homeland Security hadn’t even thought about how to do it. By the time screenings started, commercial flights had long since been grounded.

  It wasn’t just the executive branch that was laden with incompetence. The House and The Senate were just as pitiful. Congress never saw a crisis it didn’t try to exploit, and the zombie apocalypse was no exception. If the parties weren’t already entrenched and oppositional, they were ten-fold now.

  “Need emergency funding for relief to metropolitan Chicago? Fuck you, we have to stop the spending somewhere!”

  “Cut my irrelevant ear-mark in a bill that gives the military authority to set up refugee centers in American cities? Fuck you! What do I get out of it?”

  “This bill makes sense, but makes the opposing party look good…fuck you. I’ll make up some reason to vote it down.”

  Some congressmen courted their base by toeing the line that the entire issue was a religious one. The rapture crowd was a vocal minority, but man, were they vocal. There was news footage of some representatives actually claiming that flesh-eating undead monsters had human rights, and actually floated federal bills that made it illegal to kill them. There were state and local governments that didn’t just put forth bills like that, but actually passed them.

  There was no end to the insanity. In the beginning, before we really understood the epidemic, there were some extremists within government that wanted to quarantine every town in the nation, and go door to door looking for infected, shooting them on sight. Draconian policies like this smacked of Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia, and the backlash from the American public was so extreme that the CDC saw incident reporting drop like a stone. Conversely, CDC field agent casualties – a term that I had never before even seen in a report – skyrocketed. The last thing you should tell an American citizen, is that the government is going to come to their home and kill someone they love. We knew the epidemic was spreading, but now, thanks to a couple of career politicians who wanted to look like John Wayne to their constituency, the CDC was blinded and their people were being killed.

  When things started getting really bad, representatives went t
o their home districts so they could put their own face to their voters’ salvation. This is when things got much worse. Every senator and congressmen wanted to be the man or woman who saved The Empire State Building, the Lincoln Memorial, the public library, or some little old lady’s house. Hundreds of established and defensible military perimeters were moved and thinned, quickly became indefensible, and then failed. Hard choices had been made by the few capable people left in leadership. Sadly, those choices were immediately and directly undermined by politicians who didn’t just lack an understanding of the situation, but had a rooted self-interest in exploiting it however they could. These so-called leaders had spent so much time in Washington that they didn’t even know how to stop campaigning when their very survival depended on it. People were dying by the thousands and rising from the grave, and the people with the power to make a difference were worried about their next election. Ultimately, it doesn’t matter if you’re a high-powered senator or a public school janitor. Your brains taste the same to the zombies. Way too many Americans and far too few politicians found that fact out the hard way.

  Still, the common people, the average every day schmoes, weren’t completely blameless. When the local grocery store runs out of food and families start missing meals, neighbors start shooting each other over a can of soup. Then neighbors’ families and friends get involved, and suddenly, there are millions of little Hatfield and McCoy style wars raging in every town and city in the world. The reality that the undead were beating down our door was bad enough, but we made it even worse when we did our part to add to their number. News footage of Miami and Seattle were looking like Baghdad after the American invasion drove home the sense that we weren’t in this together. We were on our own.

  America alone produces enough food to feed the entire world. With a little rationing and logistics, every man, woman, and child, would have enough food to last over a year – I saw the reports. Hell, I reviewed plans that the Secretary of Agriculture had written up to make sure not one fat-ass beer-drinking American missed a meal. Even if that meal wasn’t going to be a thick cut of prime rib or a greasy hamburger, it was still a meal. He was a good guy. The cabinet was an embarrassment, but the Secretary of Agriculture really stood apart from the rest of us. The only problem was, by the time we got past the petty arguments about whether it was a legal use of imminent domain to turn an abandoned skyscraper into a hydroponic tomato farm…we no longer had the manpower or infrastructure available to execute.