The Romero Strain (Book 2): The Dead, The Damned & The Darkness

by Ts Alan

  She took stock of what provisions she had. She knew she had enough food for about three months. There were plenty of beverages, too. The water was still running, so she would be able to wash and use the bathroom. And it appeared that there was enough toilet paper to last for a couple of months. But she knew that all she needed was not within the comforting confines of the restaurant. There were a limited number of votive candles for illumination, and there were only two flashlights with apparently no spare batteries that she could find anywhere. This would be a problem. The thought of having to spend countless days, weeks, perhaps months in total isolation without the luxury of lighting would be unbearable. She also needed something to sleep on, a new pair of shoes—the pair of men’s New Balance sneakers she had found in the manager’s office were too big for her—and some Tampons. She knew where to find all of the items, and that was at Kmart.

  Down the corridor to the left, past TGI Fridays, past the Haagen-Dazs ice cream shop, and past Dunkin Donuts was Kmart. However, when she arrived she found that the security gate had been drawn and secured with two large, heavy-duty locks, one on each side of the gate rail. She knew where the batteries were—they were to the right as you crossed through the entrance hall into the main area of the store—close to the checkout registers. But they were far out of reach with no way to remove the locks, and she knew she wasn’t going to prowl around the underground of Penn Station looking for a LIRR maintenance room in search of a pair of bolt cutters. She rattled the gate out of frustration, and then realized that might have been a mistake. The entrance she stood before was actually the basement level to the store. The main entrance was one level up and a street over on the south side of 34th Street; the underground floor was actually larger than its ground level. The noise she had made could attract whatever may be lurking in the upper parts of the store. She paused, silent, and listened and watched for any motion or sight of anything prowling in the murky light. After a moment, she was mostly satisfied that she hadn’t roused anything’s attention. She went to the other gate to the left, which was at the smaller entranceway to the left of a large display window. She surveyed the gate. This one had no locks on the two side rails. She looked down at the floor. She stared momentarily in disbelief. The floor lock had not been secured. She knelt down, thinking her eyes had played a trick on her in the low illumination, but it was true, the high security padlock had not been secured into the wide, hardened solid steel body.

  She slowly and cautiously raised the grill style gate up into its recess. Though the gate had been left unlocked there was still the matter of the sliding plate glass doors that barred her entrance. On the very top of the archway was a three position switch that read: Open, Close and Off. The indicator knob was pointing to ‘Open’, but the doors were sealed. She tried to open them by squeezing her fingers in between the lips of where the doors met and pulling them back, but there wasn’t enough room to get a grip. She needed to be able to slip something into the crack and pry it open enough in order to pull them apart, and then it occurred to her—the large, heavy gauge kitchen knife she had brought. The door opened easily, she slipped in and proceeded to the checkout area to acquire a shopping cart and to stockpile needed batteries. She grabbed a few snacks too, the usual “junk food” you always find near the checkout registers.

  She pushed her cart down the main corridor heading north to the personal care section. After stocking up on soap, shampoo, and feminine hygiene products, she made her way toward the sporting goods area. Sporting goods was further into the low-lit recesses of the store and would bring her closer to the escalator that led to the main level. Though going to the bedding area upstairs to get a pillow and blankets would have been optimal, it was also the most dangerous thing she could do. If there weren’t creatures roaming around upstairs already looking for a meal, the sight of her through all the glass windows that made up the building’s exterior would certainly be an invitation for a dinner. It was dangerous enough doing what she was doing by entering into an unknown and potentially life-threatening situation, and she was not about to tempt fate by purposely putting her life at risk all for the sake of comfort. The sporting goods section was close enough to the tampons that she could quickly grab a sleeping bag or two and get out and back to the relative safety of the bar.

  Luck, for the moment, was on her side. There were more batteries on the end cap of the aisle as well as flashlights and portable lanterns on display in the middle of the aisle opposite the sleeping bags. She loaded up, and then turned her cart to leave when she was abruptly confronted by what appeared to be a homeless man blocking the exit into the main corridor.

  “Where you going with my stuff? It’s mine do you hear? It’s mine. Put it back, bitch!”

  The man was filthy and smelled of piss and foul body odor. He came at her. First grabbing the cart and pushing it back into Katie’s hips, and then trying to push the cart out of the way to get at her. Katie raised the knife up that she held between her hand and the handle of the shopping cart. As the man reached out to grab her she swiped at him, partially severing several of his fingers. He let out a blood-curdling scream of agony. She didn’t wait, she pulled the cart back enough that he was now directly in front of it, and then slammed it with all her strength head on into him, sending him crashing to the ground.

  She ran as fast as she could, propelling the cart toward the exit. She could hear him cursing her with “cunt” and swearing he was going to find her and kill her. For her own safety and peace of mind she closed the security gate behind her and locked him in. She couldn’t take a chance at him fulfilling his threat or the living dead being alerted to the commotion. It was safer this way. It was a matter of her survival.

  26

  A Half-mute Never Forgets

  January 11, Day 278.

  The return of his Luci had helped to relive his anguish and satisfy his carnal transmute needs, but the New Year had brought tragedy, and Luci had been savagely murdered. So this day he left the responsibilities of the armory and child care behind to seek respite from his stress and torment. Reflecting on the words of Buddha, “Do not dwell in the past, do not dream of the future, concentrate the mind on the present moment,” he decided to teach martial arts to anyone who had a desire to learn. It was for this reason that he found himself traveling south, not by foot as he so usually did—and not under the cover of darkness—but in an “Up Armored” Humvee early in the morning with Barkley by his side.

  Today was Barkley’s first road trip since arriving to the armory by Stryker. For a long time J.D. kept the retriever locked in the basement before he felt comfortable taking him on walks outside the armory gates. J.D. didn’t like to keep Barkley confined, although the basement was extremely large, but whereas his former canine Max—named for Max von Stephanitz the creator of German Shepherd breed—was intelligent, affectionate and social, Barkley was particular about who he would allow near him. He was very well behaved and affectionate when it came to Katie and Caitlin, but ornery when it came to any male who tried to touch him, with the exception of J.D. This led J.D. to believe his previous owner had been a female. Barkley had also been easy to train, enforcing J.D.’s assumption that Barkley had been an AKC show dog, however it was safer to keep him away from the populace until J.D. was sure he could be fully reintroduced into life with humans.

  Barkley’s mild anti-social behavior was acceptable to J.D. After all, if the animal was going to be a part of the armory community the dog needed to earn his keep, and house pet was not what J.D. had planned for him. J.D. was training Barkley to be a patrol dog. Barkley learned quickly and was an obedient canine, except when it came to attack mode. J.D. knew this was because the dog did not have an aggressive nature like German and Dutch shepherds or Belgian Malinois that were the vast majority of U.S. military working dogs. Except one day as the two were on foot patrol a few blocks from the armory, Barkley showed his true potential. He caught the scent of two half-mutes a mo
ment before J.D. had realized their presence. Barkley went into full attack mode, trying to pull the leash from J.D.’s hand to go after the two predators. The sound of Barkley’s furious barking along with a screech from J.D. sent the two stalkers fleeing. Barkley had proved himself as a useful animal.

  It should have been a quick ride to his destination, but the city’s decaying infrastructure caused a re-routing due to a massive flood on Chrystie Street a few hundred feet before the intersection of Grand. The body of water was immense and encompassed blocks east and west, as well as those ahead of him, but J.D. knew Chinatown almost as well as he knew his own East Village. There were other ways to his objectives.

  His first stop had been to the Lin Sister Herb Shop—not owned by one sister, but by Frank Lin and his sisters, Susan and Jane—on Bowery and Doyers Streets. He had broken into the store to acquire some herbs—specifically Yunnan Baiyoa—teas, ointments, Dit Da Jow, and, of great importance, acupuncture needles. He was happy to see that the rats, mice, and other vermin had not managed to find their way into the large cut glass apothecary dispensary jars and eaten the over 500 herbal remedies they sold.

  Arriving on Mulberry Street, he pulled the Humvee in front of BLT Merchandise. BLT (letters which stand for the words “good fortune” in Cantonese) was a shop J.D. knew well. This had been the martial arts supply store from where he had purchased most of his martial arts gear, including his zai.

  Over the years of patronage J.D. had befriended owner Jonathan Choy and his family, who helped run the shop. He also knew that most of what was in the shop display cases and mounted on the wall was for tourists. Most of what he had come for was on the shelves in the confines of the storage room. He had come for uniforms, footwear, equipment, and weapons.

  The shop consisted of a small, narrow showroom, a small studio—where Choy taught children “black tiger” kung fu once a week—accessed at the back of the store along with a storage area. The storefront exterior consisted of two glass windows with an accompanying single commercial glass door separating them. However, the store was closed; its metal roll down gate was secured closed with a padlock on each side of its vertical runners. Nonetheless, J.D. had come prepared. He had brought bolt cutters.

  He stepped out of the vehicle, taking with him the bolt cutters from in between the two front seats. “Stay,” he told Barkley, in a firm tone and then closed the driver’s door.

  With two quick snips from the cutters, the heavy-duty security locks fell to the ground. J.D. took the looped length of chain and began to pull downward to get the vertical-lift-gate operator to retract the roll door. The noise was tremendous, unlike the gate of the Lin Sister’s shop. He stopped his hurried action, paused, and momentarily waited, looking up and down the street. Barkley stared at him from the open passenger window. Nothing came running toward him. He saw no half-mutes bounding toward him, but J.D. knew this didn’t mean there wasn’t the possibility of them. “Anything can happen at any time, and probably will,” was one of his philosophies. Caution was the word of the moment. He slowed his chain action, but the noise still reverberated down the street.

  The glass door was also locked. However, J.D. had a solution for this, too. Again he used the bolt cutters, slamming the head of the tool into the glass nearest the lock mechanism. The glass shattered and fell away. He reached inside and unlocked the deadbolt. Entering, he walked past the display cases and to the back of the shop, and opened the unlocked door to the studio.

  J.D. retracted a six-inch Cyalume ChemLight stick from the left leg pant pocket of his military pants, bent the plastic light stick, breaking the small thin-walled glass ampoule contained inside, and shook it, mixing its liquids. The chemiluminescence was immediate. He headed to the storage room. He didn’t need the glow stick. It was more out of habit than necessity. After his blind rage of savagery against those who butchered Luci, he hadn’t noticed that his eyesight had gained more night vision, only that in the days that followed they were painful. It wasn’t until Doctor France’s examination and testing that he realized he had better perception in the dark, however, his irises had also gotten marginally larger.

  The last items J.D. brought out from the back were two small boxes. He placed them next to the retrieved goods on top of the glass display case closest to the entry door for a clearer examination. The boxes were marked, ‘BRITISH GURKHA ARMY KUKURI KNIFE - Service No. 1, Kathmandu, Nepal.’ He knew BLT sold many styles of martial arts weapons, but he had never seen any kukri in the shop. The two boxes were the only two that he had found, and he wondered if it had been a special order that had not been picked up. He opened one of them and removed the knife that was wrapped in high quality handmade lokta paper.

  The kukri blade was similar to the bolo machetes he had once carried. Both armaments were used by foreign country soldiers for warfare and by civilians as a woodcutting and general-purpose tool. However, the blade of the kukri, compared to a bolo, had a distinctive forward drop intended to act as a weight on the end of the blade and make the knife fall on the enemy faster and with more power. As for attacking, like his machetes, the kukri was most effective as a chopping/slashing weapon.

  He removed the knife from its cotton wood scabbard that was covered in water buffalo leather. The weapon he held in his hand was genuine military issue, with a full tang, razor sharp high-grade ten-inch carbon steel blade with kaura notch, and a five-inch water buffalo horn handle with solid brass butt—identical to those used by the Gurkha of Singapore, India, Nepal and British Gurkha Regiments. The two kukri could be a replacement for his bolo machetes. However, he would need to combat test them before making a decision.

  Abruptly, Barkley began a vocal tirade that was loud enough to reach the interior of the store. He took the two blades with him and dashed to the door.

  J.D. knew better than to ignore a barking Barkley, and upon investigation he found that the canine was under attack by two very agitated half-mutes, who seemed to be particularly interested in getting into the vehicle to make Barkley their meal.

  Barkley appeared to have the upper hand, almost literally. The dog had latched on to one of the creature’s hands and was pulling ferociously as the creature was attempting to pull away. The predators were too consumed by their desire to get at Barkley that they did not see J.D. cross the shop’s threshold or hear the noise of the broken glass under his feet as he made his way carefully to the street, unsheathing the kukri as he stepped onto the sidewalk.

  It would have been quicker to dispatch these wretched once-humans with his sidearm, but pistols make noise and there had already been enough noise, and J.D. did not want to attract anymore of the creatures.

  “Hey! Tweedle-dee and Tweedle-dumb. Come get some,” he taunted, knowing that his acerbic words were not something they could comprehend. Nevertheless, his voice got their attention.

  They charged, as they always did, blindly and furiously. A quick sidestep and a fierce slashing motion to the back of a neck, and the head of one lopped off and fell to the ground. The other turned quickly, reaching out inches from him. J.D. had no time to pivot, to make a proper defensive move, so he thrust the blades forward, and though the blades were not designed for stabbing, the blades still penetrated deeply into the creature’s abdomen. The half-mute stopped, the look of rage leaving its eyes, replaced by astonishment, then blankness. It was dead.

  J.D. retracted the weapons. A horrid cry broke the silence. J.D. quickly turned his head around. Abruptly a half-mute pounced on him from above, like it had fallen out of a void.

  J.D.’s weapons tore from his hands as he and his enemy violently crashed to the ground, and then tumbled across the sidewalk toward the Humvee. Barkley barked furiously for a moment and then jumped out the open window.

  Shrieking and tearing like two adversarial felines, it was a full on, a claws-out death match with both predators locked together, rolling around making horrible noises, as Barkley tried to come to
J.D.’s rescue. J.D. tried desperately to grasp the grip of his pistol that was strapped to his right side, but the flailing claws of the half-mute ripped at him, preventing him from moving his arms too far away from protecting his face.

  Suddenly J.D. was free. The half-mute had released him to turn on Barkley. The dog let out a squeal as it was knocked to the ground with his fur flying. J.D. let out a horrid screech and then drove the fingers of his right hand into the throat of the mutant as it turned back to J.D.

  The half-mute paused shocked by the piercing of its larynx. Then it flailed, feverishly grasping at J.D.’s hand, which was still impaled in its throat. The creature gurgled, blood spilling from its mouth. Its cold eyes went dead and its body went limp. J.D. extracted his talons and threw the dead creature aside.

  Barkley had not been down for long. He stood above the creature as he intently growled at the corpse. For a moment, J.D. hunched over shaking as he took in deep breathes. Then regaining his composure, he stood up and commanded Barkley to sit and be silent. J.D. picked up his weapons, and then began a thorough examination of the dog. The canine had not been seriously injured. Besides the missing fur the cuts he had received had barely penetrated the skin. It was most likely the yelp and tumble had been a glancing blow instead of a full-on talon swipe. J.D. rewarded Barkley’s courage with his favorite tug toy. Barkley shook it vigorously in his mouth as J.D. kept guard.

  As J.D. slid into the driver’s seat, he looked at Barkley. Barkley looked at him, and then the dog whimpered. “That was too much work so early in the morning,” J.D. told him, and then rubbed the animal behind the ears. He extracted a rag from underneath his seat and began to clean his blades. “We’ll stay here for a few more minutes,” he told the canine, “until you settle so I clean your wounds.”

  J.D. was still slightly shaking as he wiped his blades clean. He realized that it was more than nerves that was causing his trembling; his body needed nutrition. His post-viral transformation had caused a higher metabolism rate that demanded greater sustenance, especially after exerting himself in battle. He opened his backpack and took out a 24-ounce bottle of Gatorade carbohydrate energy drink and a plastic pouch of beef jerky.