“Another day in the neighborhood,” Chad joked as he reached us.
Liam and I both smiled.
“Have you made your decision?” I asked, standing and taking a step toward him, searching his face with my eyes.
“Yup,” he said, not meeting my gaze. “You two ready for breakfast?”
I opened my mouth to speak, to see if I could convince him to confide in me, but he turned away and headed for the exit closest to the cafeteria. I knew we had to report to building B again this morning, after we’d eaten. All of us “exceptions” had to make our decision today. We had to decide what our roles would be in this new world. We had to decide if we were going to embrace and use our difference to help others, or just melt into the background with everyone and everything else.
The dining hall was too loud for conversations again, which I was sad about. I felt a little hurt that Chad wouldn’t talk to me and tell me what he was thinking. I wanted to know if he was going to stay or not. I wanted to know if I was going to lose him…
My stomach was in knots, but I forced myself to act normal and eat despite what I was feeling.
I noticed Chad only ate half of his breakfast before we headed out of the cafeteria and toward our fates at building B. I figured that meant he was nervous too. That didn’t bode well with me. For some reason, I thought for sure he would decide to leave with nothing but the clothes on his back. I knew he would have a decent chance of survival without food or a weapon because he was smart. The plans he’d laid out to get us here with plenty of supplies had proven that. I hoped I was wrong.
From my understanding of the process, when we arrived at building B we would stand in a line and be taken one-by-one into small interview rooms to discuss and make our decisions. Then we’d all gather in the room we’d been in yesterday morning to get our assignments and go from there.
I thought it was kinda silly. I didn’t know why we didn’t just go to the main room and have all our questions answered collectively. But then I thought people might feel better making such a serious decision privately, without peer pressure. Becoming an elite team member meant you’d be putting yourself in danger for the preservation of the human race. I figured people who chose not to do it might feel guilty; they wouldn’t want to make that decision with all eyes on them.
I knew I was making the right choice – there was no other option for me. I knew I wasn’t some badass killer or anything, hardly soldier material actually, but I knew I was making the right choice and I would try with all I had. I would do my damnedest to make sure I had a good life, and to try and get my dad a good life. I knew Tob would be fine, because he too was an exception. He was just too young and sick to be forced into making a decision. Chances were, he’d never get a choice. He’d just grow up in the new society where joining the elite would be his only path.
Since Chad wasn’t talking and I was pent up with nervous energy, I chatted with Liam while we waited in line. I couldn’t help but glance at Chad every now and again though, because all my nervousness was about him. I wanted to tell him how I felt, but I couldn’t bring myself to ask him to stay for me. I couldn’t put that kind of pressure on him after only knowing him for a couple day. Yeah, we’d been through a lot together, but we were still strangers. Familiar strangers, but strangers still.
It would break my heart to see him go. I wanted to cry just thinking about saying goodbye.
The three of us were separated and went through the process. It didn’t take me long as I had made my decision and just had to get the details of my future life.
A short time later, we all ended up in the same room with each other. None of us spoke while we waited for the rest of the fifteen to appear.
When Commander Reese entered a few minutes after we were all together, we sat at attention to see what would happen next.
She had a clipboard with papers attached to it.
“Today has been a big day for all of you, I’m sure,” she began. “I’m pleased that twelve of you have decided to join the elite team – you will go from here to your training. Two of you have opted to leave and take your chances out in the world – there will be a unit outside that will take you two miles away and drop you off. And, it looks like one of you has chosen to become a citizen – you will go to the cafeteria when we’re done here.” She paused and looked the group over. “Does anyone have any questions?”
No one raised their hand or spoke up.
“The names that follow will be the new elite cadets,” she said, and spoke all the names on the list aloud.
I stared down at my hands while listening to the names. Dread filled me with each name spoken that wasn’t Chad’s. I was about to start crying when I heard his name…the last on the list.
I couldn’t believe my ears. I was shocked.
I looked at Chad and beamed a smile at him when I realized I wasn’t imagining that he was staying, that we would stay together. I was so happy, tears welled up in my eyes.
He smiled back at me.
Right then I could have thrown myself at him and kissed him, but I restrained myself…barely.
We would take on the world and make it better…for everyone. We were embracing our differences and accepting our strengths…together.
I couldn’t wait to get started.
To be continued…Winter 2017
Zpoc Exception Series
Re-Civilize
Book 3 – Liam
By Rebecca Besser
Author Rebecca Besser
Rebecca Besser resides in Ohio with her wonderful husband and amazing son. They've come to accept her quirks as normal while she writes anything and everything that makes her inner demons squeal with delight. She's best known for her work in adult horror, but has been published in fiction, nonfiction, and poetry for a variety of age groups and genres. She's entirely too cute to be scary in person, so she turns to the page to instill fear into the hearts of the masses.
Rebecca’s Website: http://www.rebeccabesser.com
Rebecca’s Blog: http://rebeccabesser.wordpress.com
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UNDEAD DRIVE-THRU
By Rebecca Besser
PROLOGUE - TWO YEARS AGO . . .
Betty Jones was setting the table for supper when her husband, Sam, stumbled through their apartment’s door. His clothes were torn and duct tape was hanging from his wrists, knees, and ankles. After only five steps through the doorway, he fell hard onto the floor with a grunt.
“Sam!” Betty screamed and ran down the hall, dropping to her knees beside him. She lifted his head and cradled it in her left arm, stroking his cheek tenderly with her right hand. “What happened?”
His eyes fluttered open and he looked up at his wife with pain etched across his face. “Betty . . .” he breathed and then passed out, his head lulling to the side.
Betty shook him and yelled, “Sam! Wake up!”
He didn’t respond. As she moved to lay his head gently on the floor so she could call 9-1-1, she noticed two things: 1) The tape that had apparently been used to bind him, had been cut and not ripped; and 2) There was a small red circle on the side of his neck. On closer inspection, she noted that there was a tiny hole in the center, reminding her of an injection site.
Without thinking on these discoveries for any longer than a split second, she pulled herself to her feet with the help of a small table set in the hallway and rushed to the phone to call for emergency assistance. She’d just gotten through to an operator when Sam suddenly woke up with a loud, startling moan.
Betty
dropped the phone into its cradle and darted back into the hall to help Sam to his feet, because his movements were slow and awkward.
She gasped when he was finally standing and she could look up into his face. His eyes were glazed and cloudy – almost completely white – and slobber was running down his chin, dripping onto his shirt.
“Sam, what happened to you?” she asked on a gasping sob. “Please, tell me!”
He leaned closer to her and sniffed loudly before a crooked grin spread across his face, the drool increasing in volume. Without warning he lunged forward and tried to pin her to the wall as his jaws snapped open and shut, seeking flesh.
She spun slightly when he tried to attack her and broke free of his strong grasp, falling to the floor between the hall and the bathroom. The strength of his forward advance flung him headfirst into the bathroom, leaving him sprawled on the tile floor. Quickly, Betty rose up on her knees and gripped the doorknob, yanking the door shut as the phone began to ring, trapping him.
She was sobbing uncontrollably and leaned back against the door for support; she was shaking too badly to hold herself up on her own. She screamed every time he slammed against the solid wood with the entire weight of his body, hissing and moaning.
Slowly, she crawled over to the phone and answered it; the emergency dispatcher was on the line. Betty fought for composer and forced her mind to work. She knew if she told them about Sam, they would come and take him away. After all, she’d seen enough zombie movies to know what he’d become. They would either use him as an experiment – which she thought someone already had because of the tape and the wound on his neck – or they would simply kill him.
In the most controlled, assured voice she could manage, she told the operator that she’d accidentally dialed the wrong number and apologized.
After hanging up the phone, Betty let the sobs she was holding back break forth again.
Once she again regained some composure, she stood and walked shakily back to the bathroom door where the banging continued. She placed her palms flat on the smooth, white, painted surface of the wood and rested her forehead between them.
“Sam,” she called out, “I don’t know what has happened to you, but I’ll be here for you forever. I love you . . .” She paused as her voice caught on a sob. “. . . so much. I’ll take care of you as long as I live, and won’t let anything or anyone hurt you. I promise!”
On the other side of the door, the hungry zombie who’d once been her husband continued to try to get the food he knew was just out of reach; pounding, moaning, clawing, hissing, wanting . . .
CHAPTER 1 - HIRED
“This can’t be the place. It looks too . . . creepy,” Kyndra said as she looked through the windshield of the car at the half-wasted away diner sitting in front of them.
The building was definitely an old burger joint/milkshake stand, but it had seen better days. The white paint was now a sandy beige color and the once bright green roof looked like a swirling puddle of faded vomit; the dark brown, splintered boards that made up the roof peeked through where the paint had chipped off and added to the effect.
“It’s the address in the ad,” Colleen said, parking in the gravel parking lot, directly in front of the small building.
“Yeah, I know, but who would want to eat here?” Kyndra asked with her nose wrinkled in disgust. She looked down at the newspaper ad she held in her hand. At the top it said: HELP WANTED. The girls had come to be interviewed, as they needed summer jobs. “I just don’t see a bunch of people coming here, is all.”
“Well, apparently they do or otherwise they wouldn’t be looking for help,” Colleen said, killing the engine and opening the driver’s door, while pointing at a square window to the right of the diner’s door as she got out. “Look, there’s a help wanted sign, so it has to be the right place.”
Kyndra frowned, sighed, and then shrugged, shoving the ad into her pocket as she opened the door on the passenger’s side and climbed out, too. “It’s faded and looks like it’s been there for years. Are you sure you didn’t find the ad in an old newspaper?”
“No,” Colleen said, rolling her eyes. “It was in the Sunday paper. You were there when I cut it out, remember?”
Kyndra didn’t answer, but slowly walked up to the building and cupped her hands around her face, pressing them close to the window to peer inside.
“Stop that!” Colleen scolded, rushing forward and slapping her friend on her bare arm. “You look like a peeper. We want them to give us jobs, not think we’re freaks!”
Kyndra pulled back and shrugged, looking at her tall, slender friend. Colleen’s color was high from embarrassment and the heat; her face was flushed bright red. Her shoulder length blonde hair was limp from the humidity and it stuck to the sides of her face and neck where she was sweating. But what caused Kyndra to pause and think, as she was about to come back with a smart-ass comment, was the worry in her friend’s light blue eyes. Colleen had always been the shy one, and with all of the other jobs in town already taken, they really needed to make a good impression here.
With a heavy sigh, she stepped back from the window and fidgeted with her clothes.
“Sorry . . . Do I look okay?” Kyndra asked as she tucked her long, dark, curly hair behind her ear and bit her bottom lip; despite her brash manner, there was concern in her dark eyes as well. If they didn’t find jobs soon, they wouldn’t be able to make the money they needed for the move to New York and the apartment they planned to share. They’d both recently turned eighteen and were eager to be out on their own, but they needed money to do so. Living in a small town, jobs were scarce, but having to drive a long distance would cut into their earnings and they didn’t want to do it unless they had to. This was their last chance before they would have to look for out of town work.
“You’re fine,” Colleen said, smiling, “stop worrying. Besides, from the appearance of this place, I don’t think it’ll matter what we look like.”
Kyndra laughed. “True.” She pulled the diner door open and bowed with a flourish, beckoning her friend to enter. “After you.”
Colleen laughed and some of the tension eased from her shoulders as she walked through the door, stepping out of the sun and into the dimly lit interior of the building. Kyndra followed. They both stopped instantly and covered their noses with their hands, blinking rapidly while their eyes adjusted. What they saw around them when their vision cleared shocked them both.
The interior of the diner was in even worse shape than the outside. The teal-colored vinyl on the booth seats was ripped, melted, and discolored, as was the same vinyl on the swiveling bar stools. The black and white checkered tile on the floor was cracked, broken, and in some places, missing completely. Cobwebs and dust coated everything and the smell was the worst part of all; the air reeked as if something large had died and decayed inside the building.
Kyndra looked over at Colleen and shook her head. “Do you still think we came to the right place?” she mumbled behind her hand, keeping her voice low and discreet in case anyone was close that they couldn’t see.
Colleen was about to answer when they heard voices coming from beyond the wall that stood behind the counter. A middle-aged woman and a young man – having a somewhat heated conversation – appeared in a window-sized hole in the wall with a metal topped counter between it and the filthy service area. Before either of them could decide what to do, they were spotted as well.
“Hello,” the woman said in a friendly, welcoming voice. “You must be the girls who called about interviews! I’ll be right with you.”
“I hope we go outside for the interview,” Kyndra mumbled.
“Shh!” Colleen hissed, and elbowed her friend in the stomach. “She’ll hear you!”
The woman came bustling out of a red swinging door with a small round window at face level, or at least the face level of a somewhat average height person – the woman was not average though, she was short and plump. Her hair was shoulder length and a salt and p
epper mixture of black and gray. Her eyes were hazel and held energy and intelligence. But it was her smile that really drew the girls’ attention, because it was broad and genuine.
“Hi, I’m Betty,” the woman said, extending her hand out to shake theirs. “But you can call me Aunt-B.” The girls dropped their hands from their noses and shook the woman’s hand, trying to pretend that the noxious smell didn’t exist. “How about we go outside to talk? It’s stifling in here!”
The girls grinned, nodded, and relaxed a bit; the woman seemed down to earth and friendly, despite the argument she’d just been having.
As they were stepping out the door, Aunt-B turned back and hollered to the young man she’d left behind. “I’ll be outside if you need me, John!”
“Okay!” was hollered back in a somewhat agitated voice, followed by strange grunts and moans.
The girls assumed John – whoever he was – was doing some heavy lifting or other manual labor and that accounted for the sounds, so they thought nothing of it and continued outside.
When all three of them were standing on the crumbling cement sidewalk that ran across the full length of the front of the building, they took deep breaths of the humid, but clean-smelling, air and enjoyed the slight breeze that was blowing, giving them some relief from the heat.
“I’ll interview you both at once, if that’s okay,” Aunt-B said. “We’re kinda busy today with figuring out what we’ll need for the renovations. Thank God my nephew John came to visit for the summer or I’d be lost.”
The girls smiled politely and nodded.
“What I need are a couple of waitresses,” Aunt-B continued. “John is going to cook, but we’ll need help out front. I’d also like you to start before we officially open. There’s a lot of cleaning and painting that will need to be done and the sooner we get it done, the better.”
Aunt-B went on to explain her plans and how she hoped to turn the old diner into a rest stop/drive-thru for truckers and locals, since it was situated between town and the highway. She explained their pay and everything else they needed to know, and as of that moment, they had jobs.
Zpoc Exception Series (Book 2): Re-Civilize (Elaine) Page 8
