Fear of the Dead

by Mortimer Jackson

  He brought the generator back to the KTLU building, and aligned the fuel cap with that of the truck’s.

  Now all he needed was a pipe.

  Linus searched the radio station. One of the office rooms had a fish tank. The water was rotten brown, and if there were any fish inside, he couldn’t see them now.

  The tank was rested atop a cherry wood commode. Inside its drawers, Linus saw amongst other things, packets of guppy food, a water conditioner, and a cleaning tube for the tank.

  The tube was a little small, but Linus was in a hurry to get this done. He took the tube outside, where he connected one end to the truck, and the other a few inches from his lips.

  “Goddamn it,” he cursed out loud, and breathed in a few times before blowing in. It worked, but not without leaving the bitter taste of gasoline in his mouth. Linus spat and spat until all that came out was his own saliva.

  Not enough. The taste was still there, and he needed to get it out.

  Linus chowed down on a few buttermilk biscuits that he brought with him from his stay back in Costco. It didn’t completely do away with the taste, or for that matter the toxic smell. But after a whole packet’s worth of biscuits, his mouth was as clean as it was going to get. And at any rate, he had more important things to worry about.

  With the power generator fueled and ready to go, Linus brought it up to the studio where he left his recorder.

  1:15 PM

  Hope I didn’t keep you too long. A little later than expected maybe, but better late than never, right?

  I brought the power generator with me. I had it fueled with the truck I drove over here. It’s a good thing too. The truck and the generator both take unleaded gas, so it all works out.

  Things should go without a hitch now. But don’t quote me on it just yet. Save the celebrations for, say five minutes?

  I’m powering it up right now. Fingers crossed.

  1:21 PM

  The radio console ran on several different outlets. The floor underneath the table was a jumbled mess of power cables and adapters. Rather than put the generator to work right away, Linus spent the last five minutes unfurling and trying to figure out what each wire was plugged to. He took away whatever wasn’t necessary (cell phone chargers, lamp lights, etc), and connected the ones he thought were important to an extension cord, which in turn he plugged into his generator. Not a second after he did it did life suddenly spark before his eyes. The radio switchboard shot to life.

  1:23 PM

  It works! Jesus Christ I actually got this thing to work. Goddamn it, okay. So uh…what the hell do I do now?

  2:11 PM

  There was an operator’s manual on the bookshelf behind him. For the past half hour or so, Linus read up on how exactly his machine was supposed to work. During that time he kept the switchboard unplugged so as to save on fuel, and to keep the generator from ringing in his ears.

  It took him a bit of time to absorb the information. The manual, though helpful, wasn’t as easy on the layman as he’d hoped. Plus, there was a lot of short-hand at work on the station’s consoles. Everything from wiring to spare equipment, to the labels on the board. Though Linus managed to learn a lot from what he read, he placed his greatest hopes on picking it up through trial and error. It was a slow and painstaking process. But eventually, he got it.

  The studio’s switchboard and microphone were all hooked up to a computer that Linus had first wrongly assumed unimportant. He plugged them back inside the extra slots on his extension cord. He primed the power generator and booted back the console. The machine came up, and Linus inched his lips on the microphone.

  “Hello. Can anyone hear me? This is a general distress call to any evacuation units that might preside in the San Francisco, East Bay area. Please. Can anyone hear me? I am in the KTLU radio station. I repeat, I am broadcasting from 99.3 KTLU. If anybody is out there, and if anyone can hear me, please respond.”

  Linus paused. He waited, but nothing came in from his headsets. The computer recorded his voice, as did the board. He saw the dials fluctuate with the sound of his voice, going up whenever he raised his tone, then dropping whenever he stopped. The machines picked it all up, which now raised the question; was there a signal?

  Linus searched for a portable radio, which was surprisingly harder to find than he’d anticipated. After a long search, he found one at a drawer inside a conference room. He tuned the channel to 99.3, then recorded once again.

  “If you can hear me, please respond.”

  It was hard to make out the words coming from the speaker cupped to his ear. The power generator parked next door was nothing if not intrusive. Linus could scarcely hear himself think let alone speak. Thus, in order to tell for sure whether it worked, he set his recorder to play beside the microphone, then left the room altogether.

  The sound of the generator was hard to ignore, even when he was five rooms away. It's high pitched mechanical cackle showed up on his transmission, but then again so did his voice.

  My name is Linus Baxter. I am 34 years old. Two hours ago I left Palmer County, where I was living for three weeks with three other survivors. Their names are Grace Minien, Atton Stone, and Eli Desmond. We recently came into contact with another survivor. Her name is Vanessa Lowen. I am recording this tape for one reason only. In the event of my death, I need whoever is listening to this to know that there are four, maybe two survivors located inside a Costco warehouse store at 1232 Prior Lane.

  It worked.

  2:34 PM

  Now that he knew he could broadcast, Linus set his sights to providing a means to receiving messages. He sneered at his own stupidity, for having wrongly thought that he could just tell people to call in. Even if they all had the right number for the station, there were no active phone lines to call from. They'd have to find some other means of reaching to him. And he in turn, would have to find some way to reach them.

  That was when he remembered the ham radio inside his truck.

  “Hello. My name is Linus Baxter. If there is anyone that can hear me, I advise that you contact me through a radio transceiver. Again. My name is Linus Baxter. If anyone can hear me, find a radio transceiver, and reach me at the following channel. I will be monitoring the station for as long as possible. Please. If you can at all, do what you can to reach me. Once again, the name is Linus Baxter. I am relaying this message and my signal to anyone that can hear me now.”

  Linus repeated the frequency code of his radio transceiver over the air at least fifteen times before eventually giving up, and taking a break. He rested his eyes, and fell half asleep. It'd been a tiring day. And now he wanted nothing more than to rest, finally, in celebration of his success.

  4:18 PM

  The time according to Linus Baxter’s cell phone was 4:18 PM. Outside, it looked more like six.

  Linus stretched his arms and yawned. For the past two hours he’d kept the radio console disconnected, but his transceiver online; the thinking being that while he wasn’t sending a signal, he was ready to receive one at any time.

  Linus turned his spine until he joints cracked. He rubbed his eyes until he saw something standing on the doorway. She was tall, blonde, wore a long pink shirt, and jeans with holes on her knees. She was pale, and had a young complexion. Linus recognized her the instant he saw her face.

  It was Erin.

  Her clothes were clean. There was no blood anywhere on her. It looked like she hadn’t even been bit. And yet from the color of her eyes, Linus could tell she wasn’t alive.

  He jumped from his chair, and used it to put some distance between himself and the infected. Erin, or what was once Erin, lowered her teeth and growled. She spread her arms apart to cover more ground, to widen her reach. Linus backed away.

  “Get back,” he said, his lips quivering with fear. “Please. Get back.”

  But Erin didn't. Instead she stepped forward, inching her way to her human prey.

  Erin unwittingly blocked the doorway. Linus was cornered. There
was nothing he could do, and absolutely nothing he could say that would keep her from trying to eat him alive.

  “Fuck,” he gasped soundlessly.

  Erin closed in.

  “Fuck.”

  So close to finding a way out, and yet so much closer still to dying.

  She stepped closer again, and it was now that Linus realized he had only one chance to act. He did what he could to keep his wits about him, ignoring the rush of panic that was prattling throughout his veins.

  Only one chance to make it out alive. Concentrate asshole. Concentrate.

  Erin strafed to the right, moving around the chair to meet her victim. Now, as she was further away from the door, Linus tossed the leather seat in her face, then stormed out the room. His footsteps echoed along the narrow corridor, the noise increasing two-fold only once he sensed Erin chasing behind his tail. She screamed, and Linus suddenly lost control. His right foot failed to meet the carpet floor, causing his entire body to drop.

  The infected landed on top, forcing her weight down his torso. Linus squirmed her off her balance, then backed away. He coiled his left foot backwards, then sprung it to meet Erin's jaw. She was finally knocked off by his force, giving Linus more than enough time to amble back up and run. Erin continued to give chase, but Linus had the head start advantage. The only problem now rested on the fact that he didn't know where to go. Which way to move, where to turn, and which door to hide behind. His body moved on fear and instinct, heeding no mind to thought.

  Linus turned a blind corner to where the station's commemorative merits stood encased in glass. He saw briefly a woman that looked like Erin, smiling at the group shot frame while holding a golden trophy. In the corner of his eye, another picture of Erin, but here with another, shorter man. He was Hispanic, had short black hair, and a fairly large nose.

  Linus didn't catch the man's portrait for much longer than a second. He dismissed it almost as soon as he passed it by, but remembered it once again when at the end of the ensuing hallway, Linus saw the same man standing crooked, staring at him with a pair of fiery red irises.

  He stopped, his pace ceasing into a standstill. He back-pedaled two steps behind him when a voracious force sunk hard against his arm. Linus screamed. Turned around. He could feel Erin’s hair as she bit down his skin, sinking her teeth into his muscle. He threw her off and delivered a swift jab to her chin. Erin turned and hit her head on the wall. But she came back. The other man was getting closer now as well. They had him surrounded on either sides. Whichever way he looked, there was simply no avoiding them. The only alternative was a janitor’s closet on the door in front of him. Linus made haste and ran inside.

  As he slammed the door, he felt two sets of hands smack against it. Loud. Angry. Desperate. They screamed together in a discordant outcry, neither one acknowledging the voice of the other.

  Linus touched the spot where he’d been bit. It was less painful than it looked, but his arm was bleeding.

  “Fuck!”

  He held his back against the door, all whilst removing his shirt and using it to stop the bleeding. In time he realized that despite their best efforts at plowing through the door, it hadn’t and wouldn’t occur to them to try the knob. Good for him, because the door didn’t lock from the inside.

  He let go of the door. They banged and pushed and shoved and smacked. But it was pointless. They weren’t getting in no matter how hard they tried.

  Not having to worry about them getting in gave Linus the chance to turn his mind other, greater worries. Namely the fact that now he was as good as dead.

  4:32 PM

  I guess I might not be making it after all. There are two of them outside. They’ve been banging on that door like their lives depend on it. And they bit me.

  So what now?

  4:38 PM

  If you had a million dollars, what would you do? Me, I'd buy myself some cheap farmland. Probably in a state where I could get the most amount of acres for the price. I don’t know. Maybe Texas, or a place like that.

  I think it'd be pretty cool. I’d get the chance to grow my own crops. And I’d make them the way I want them. Real organic crops. No pesticides, no monkeying around with mother nature. None of that stuff.

  I think it’d be nice to finally live in a place that isn’t a city. I don’t know how Kerry’d feel about it, but she could definitely get used to it. Because I’m tired of seeing concrete wherever I go. I think a home on the hillside would be nice for a change.

  5:13 PM

  It's been a little rough getting used to the idea that I'll be dying soon. After going through all this shit for four months, is this really how it's all going to end? 34 years of living, and all for this one fucked up moment?

  Maybe Grace was right. Maybe things would have been a lot better if I'd stayed.

  I hope she’s doing well for herself.

  Ahh God. How long does this take anyway? Hours? Days? Months? It's already been about an hour and a half. Aside from the pain and fucking misery of being bitten, I can't tell that anything inside me has changed. I've been losing my mind, but I'm still myself. Not like I need to convince you of that though. I am still talking aren't I?

  6:08 PM

  My father used to be a cop. I guess you could say it was back in the days when kids started losing respect for their elders. He said he worked a lot of riot control jobs in the city, swinging batons at college kids. Hippies. Black people. You name it. He told me all about it when I was all grown up. When I didn’t think I could have resented him any more.

  But that’s not the point. He told me all about it to make the case that life was all about making the hard decisions. He told me that, even though he didn’t feel proud of what he did, what he did was survive, and life was all about survival.

  It was hard times back then. Cops had to be vicious to keep their jobs, especially with all these kids on the streets. Protestors left and right turning against every part of society. He told me the story about a few cops in his precinct who didn’t want anything to do with those protestors. They saw what the other cops were doing to those kids, and they didn’t want any part of it. My dad. He called them a bunch of prude softies. And you know what happened to them? Fired. Just like that. They lost their jobs in the blink of an eye.

  Commissioner didn’t have much patience for dissent. Anyone that wasn’t willing to do their jobs lost it on the spot. My father, he told me that it was men like that that had the conviction of their beliefs. And where did it get them?

  He said that if he ever had to relive that experience again, to choose whether to keep his conscience, and quit, or to go back out and put kids in hospitals, he said he’d be the first man out with a stick.

  Survival is all that matters. That’s what he told me. Nature doesn’t acknowledge humanity. Nature doesn’t shine on kindness. Only strength. You can be a bleeding heart till the cows come home, but it won’t get you any closer to what you want. To what you need. Sometimes there are things you just gotta do. Like chores. And he did call his job a chore. How fucked up is that?

  When I was young I thought he was the coldest asshole alive. And trust me, I’ve got no love for him. I still hate him to this day. But in a way, he was right. Sometimes the only choices we have in life are the wrong ones.

  I’ve never killed anyone before. Not even an animal. I’ve never had anyone, or anything’s blood, on my hands.

  I don’t want to go out there and face them. They might not be human anymore. But it’s hard to kill something when their face looks so much like yours. Makes me wonder how much of them is still there, trapped inside their body.

  There’s a broom in here. It’s wooden, so if I manage to break it in half the tip should be sharp enough to use as a stake.

  I’m leaving my recorder here. If you find it, then chances are I didn’t make it out. To anyone who’s listening to this, please, find out what happened to Kerry Baxter.

  Thank you.

  6:16 PM

  The banging
on the walls had stopped. The infected must have finally realized they weren’t getting in. They retreated, left until he could no longer sense their presence from underneath the door. He couldn’t tell where they might have gone. All he knew was that wherever they were, they were far enough that things were quiet again. At least for the time being.

  But then again, how certain of that could he be?

  The infected were smart creatures. It wouldn’t have been above them to wait behind a corner for him to come out. If they were doing that now, Linus worried that he might not have stood a chance against them at all. The infected had the upper hand in every way. There were two of them, and they were stronger, faster, more ferocious. All Linus had was a broken broomstick, and an injured arm.

  If his father was with him right now, he would have told him that that was all he needed. For what it was worth, he hoped he was right.

  Linus swallowed down, and slowly unfurled the knob. The spiked end of his broomstick remained at steady, poised to stab at the tiniest hint to danger. Much to his silent optimism, the infected were gone. The hallway was empty. There was no telling where they were, or if they had moved on. It was all too quiet to tell.

  He tip-toed his way outside, leaving the door ajar just in case. Linus heard static in the distance as what sounded like his radio transceiver came to life.

  “…Hello….Hello…Anyone out there….This is Alcatraz Island come over…We received your distress call come over…”