by Gayle Katz
“Makes sense, I guess. You want to be free? You want me to let you go?”
“Yes, of course. That’s exactly what I want. Would you let me go? Otherwise, why else would I help you? You’re keeping me against my will, in a cage, like an animal.”
“It’s because we need you, Jane. You’re one of the few people who has managed to survive the plague by receiving multiple versions of the cure. You’ve got all the right stuff swirling around inside you. For someone like you, your blood may hold the key to our salvation. Work with us so we can make this cure available to the rest of the world.”
I sigh. “I want to, really I do, but I already put my life on the line once to help someone and I got screwed. How do I know you won’t do the same?”
“You don’t know, but you don’t really have a choice.”
“Then why ask?”
“I’m trying to be polite – civilized, even. Since the zombie plague consumed us, we’ve lost a lot of the niceties, things that make us uniquely human. I’m trying to hold on to them.”
I think for a moment before speaking. “I’ll ask you again, what do I get out of this?”
“What do you want?”
“You know what I want… Let me go. Help me reunite with my husband, Jack. And I want everyone to leave us alone. We deserve a normal life.”
“I might be able to make that happen, but only if you voluntarily help us. And before you answer, let me remind you of something. If you couldn’t already tell, you’re stuck here. There’s no way out. You can either help us now, willingly, or we force you to help and then we leave you here, possibly forever.”
As I look at her, tears begin to form. I try to keep it together as I pace around my cage. How can I trust this person? Who knows what kind of experimental procedures they’re going to perform on me or the pain they may unleash on the world?
“Listen, stop driving yourself crazy, Jane.”
I look at her.
“I know Lance. He’s a jerk, that’s for sure. I’m guessing he’s the one who screwed you over, is that right?”
“Yeah. How’d you know?”
“Lucky guess, but I know who he is and how he operates. Lance and I go way back. We have a history together.”
“How do you know him?”
She holds up her stub for an arm.
“He cut off your arm?”
“Yeah.”
“Ouch.”
“I can’t fault him completely. One of those monsters bit my left hand,” she sighs, “so he cut it off before the plague had a chance to spread through my bloodstream and infect the rest of my body.”
“I guess that’s good, but it sounds incredibly painful.”
“You have no idea,” she pauses. “Being bitten is horrible, as you know, but having your arm chopped off… without warning and without drugs or anesthetic, that’s absolute torture. And disinfecting the open wound was agony.”
“So he did something selfless? I find that hard to believe. That doesn’t sound like the Lance I know.”
“It was a no-win situation to me. Leave the arm and I become a zombie. Cut the arm off, prevent the virus from infecting the rest of my body, and I’m deformed for the rest of my life. I was screwed either way. In the end, I thought he made the best decision at the time, but…“
“But it’s more complicated than that.”
“Yeah.”
“Everything is more difficult when you throw Lance into the mix. It sounds like he saved your life, but the Lance I know only does things for his own selfish reasons.”
“I didn’t know that then… and, unfortunately, I lost so much more than my arm when I was with him.”
“He’s a piece of crap, all right – nice and harmless when you first meet ’em, and then he turns toxic.”
“Yeah, but even in all of that evil, there’s still a hint of good in him.”
“And you know that how?”
“Lance and I were dating. Things were getting serious, and he seemed so wonderful. I liked him a lot and I could tell he felt the same about me – or so I thought. That’s when the zombie outbreak hit our town. Instead of evacuating, we stayed put. Looking back, that probably wasn’t the best idea. We boarded up the doors and windows on my first floor apartment as best we could and kept quiet. Most of the time was spent just holding each other, trying to wait it out. In the meantime, we slept in shifts so one of us was awake at all times. A few nights later while Lance was on watch duty, zombies broke in. As soon as I heard the commotion, my eyes popped open. I grabbed my bat and tried to kill as many of them as possible.
“Lance was nowhere in sight. Unfortunately, one of the zombies who slipped behind me bit me. I panicked. That’s when Lance found me, realized what happened, and chopped off my arm without a second thought. At first, I was in shock. There was no pain. None at all. And then, as if I were in a dream, I watched my arm hit the floor. Blood, my blood, was gushing everywhere. As my brain caught up with the events, excruciating pain surged through every cell of my body. It was the most pain I’d ever felt in my entire life. Exhausted from losing so much blood, I lost consciousness and fell to the floor while Lance put the rest of them down.
“Drifting in and out, I don’t remember much about what happened next. He said we couldn’t go outside since there were more running around. Without access to a hospital, he poured alcohol on my wound to sanitize it and then cauterized it using a cast iron pan he heated up. The pain… Ugh… When I think about it, I can still feel the pain paralyzing me. It’s a feeling that’s burned into my mind forever. Everything happened so fast. I tried to hold on as best I could, but I passed out. A person can only withstand so much trauma. Between what I remember and what Lance told me, that’s what happened. That’s how I lost my arm.”
“And? What happened next?”
“A few days after, as I was recovering, I noticed one of the boarded up windows was no longer boarded up. If zombies had broken into the apartment, the wooden boards would have been busted and splintered, but they were still in one piece. The nails would have been embedded in the boards, but they weren’t. The nails were separate from the boards. It’s like someone had meticulously removed them.
“Looking at the evidence right in front of me on the floor, all that was running through my mind was, ‘That turncoat!’ I was beyond furious. That same night I confronted him. At first he pretended not to know anything, but then he confessed that the company people I worked for hired him to take care of me. They noticed I was borrowing some work files and they didn’t like it. If I didn’t change my ways and go off the grid, he said, something worse was going to happen to me… by accident.”
“That’s awful.”
“Yeah, but it’s not all bad. These days I do what I need to do. I learned that no one will help me if I don’t help myself. It’s because of what happened to me that I’m dedicating my life to curing this zombie plague and all its mutations once and for all. No one should have to suffer the pain of losing a limb or turning into a zombie. Nothing will stop me from making this right. Not Lance. Not you. Not anyone. So… are you going to make our lives count for something? Will you help me?”
I’m silent for a moment. “I’m sorry about what happened to you, really, I am, but help you? How about if you help me? Look at it from my point of view. Lance tricked me. He lured me here on purpose and, once I did his bidding, he held me hostage. Not only that, he traded me to you like I was his to give away. It’s barbaric! And now you want me to help you? Who’s looking out for me? No one! That’s who. I’m sick and tired of getting screwed over by you people.”
“I know how you feel, believe me, I do—”
“How could you possibly know how I feel?”
“If you just let me finish… what I’m trying to say is that if you work with us, I promise to help you in return. The only catch is that you have to help us first. We have to develop the cure. That’s our top priority.”
“What would I have to do?”
&
nbsp; “It won’t be easy, but you’ll be helping to fight the zombie plague and save millions of innocent lives in the process.”
“That sounds great, but… I don’t know. I need more details. I have to get back to my life and let people know I’m all right.”
“That’s not possible right now.”
“What do you mean?”
“You already know. Don’t play dumb,” she says, as she walks to one corner of the lab. She comes back, rolling over a computer monitor and a keyboard. After turning on the screen and punching in a few commands on the keyboard, a video comes up. It’s Jack.
“I know about Jack. I know about the clone. Is this how you want to spend the rest of your life? Watching Jack live out the rest of his without the real you?”
“Why are you doing this?”
“Because I need your help and I’m not going— I can’t take no for an answer.”
“I-I…”
“Think about my offer. Don’t forget. This plague is about more than you and Jack. It’s about the survival of the human species. When you’re done with your pity party, I’ll be back,” she snidely remarks as she looks around at the other cages. “In the meantime, take another look around at your neighbors. Maybe that’ll help you make the right decision.” She walks to the door.
“No! Wait!” I shout as I press myself against the bars of my cell. She doesn’t give me a second look and leaves me alone with the zombies roaming around their cages retching and screeching. When she closes the door behind her, she also turns off the lights. I’m surrounded in darkness once again.
I drop to the floor, arms around my knees, rocking back and forth. Jack, help me. Please wake up. Wake up and figure out that something is wrong. You can’t believe that clone woman is me. You just can’t. You have to come and save me. Like I did for you. What am I supposed to do now? Help someone else who’ll probably end up screwing me over? Either way, I’m probably dead so why do I want to help this strange woman? How do I know she’s on the same level, that she really wants to find a permanent cure? How do I know she won’t keep the cure for herself or try to profit off of it? She’s keeping me in a cage, for God’s sake, just like she’s doing with these zombie animals. I want to believe her, but I just don’t know if I have it within myself to trust anybody anymore.
While my eyes take their time to adjust, my other senses are heightened and I start to hear odd sounds. One is a disgusting squishing and the other is a set of jaws chomp chomp chomping away. I look up and can make out the shadow of a deformed head trying to fit its way through the bars of my cell. I stand up and back away from the wretched sight. “Go away!” I shout.
The zombie responds by clicking its jaw. Over and over again. I have to put my hands over my ears. I can’t take that relentless sound anymore.
On the other end of the cell, another zombie grabs my hair and pulls me toward the bars.
“Ah! Get off of me!” I shout as I punch it in the face and pull away before it bites me. As the original zombie is still trying to push its head through the bars, some of its skin peels loose and falls to the floor. So disgusting! That, plus the incessant clicking noise of the other zombie’s jaw, is driving me insane. These guys must be hungry, but I refuse to be their dinner.
The sounds are still getting to me. Even with my hands over my ears, I can’t completely block them out. I decide to sit on the side of the cell that’s adjacent to the wall, close my eyes, and stick my fingers in my ears. After a few hours of dealing with the stress, I’m too exhausted to do anything else and I fall asleep on the floor.
Chapter 4
________________________________________
Half asleep, I stare into the darkness of the room. As my eyes adjust to the pitch-dark space around me, I see zombies idly standing around. It’s then that I notice someone, or something, present who wasn’t here before. I stare and try to get a sense of their movement patterns before opening my mouth. If I’m going to cause a ruckus, it better be worth it.
Continuing my surveillance of this potential compatriot, I see them stand up, sit down, and get up again to pace around their cell. So far their behavior isn’t totally unlike that of a zombie, but then I see this person get down on their knees and begin to pray. No zombie I’ve encountered has ever done that. I’ve never been big into religion, but I know people who are. We’re all different, so what gives me strength may not be what gives someone else the fuel to go on. For me, it’s simple. I think about Jack and that helps me stay the course. I guess that loving Jack, in some strange way, is my religion. For others, talking with their God might be how they handle difficult situations. And what we’re going through here is definitely problematic.
I’d like to know that I’m not alone here so I decide to offer up an olive branch and reach out, figuratively, to this stranger a couple cells down the way.
“Hello?” I whisper.
No answer.
“Hello? Can you hear me?” I ask again, louder this time.
“Yes,” the shadowy figure responds. This unknown person is a woman. “What do you want?”
“I just want to talk.”
“Talk? I haven’t talked with anyone in quite a while.”
“That’s OK. What’s your name?”
“Cate. My name is Cate.”
“It’s nice to meet you, Cate. I’m Jane. If you don’t mind me asking, how long have you been stuck in here?”
“Uhhh. I don’t know. I can’t remember. I’ve lost track of the days. In the beginning, I tried to keep a record of every 24 hours that passed, but they blur together so easily in here as you can probably imagine.”
“Yeah, I understand that. Do you know how you got here?”
“Ummm. I think so. It’s been a while. Gimme a second to remember.”
“Sure. Take your time.”
“If my memory serves, my husband and I were visiting his parents. Yeah. That’s right. It was their anniversary. Their 50th. We were eating lunch at a fancy restaurant when there was an outbreak in the kitchen. We heard a man screaming and dishes crashing to the floor. W-We tried to get out…”
“Take a breath if you need it.”
“The stupid host sat us at the table closest to the kitchen because the place was packed. It was already getting late. And we didn’t want to go anywhere else so we took the last table. And… and…”
“It’s OK. Take your time.”
“I heard about outbreaks on the news, you know, but I had never been in the middle of one before. It was surreal, like a nightmare. I didn’t know what to do. I’m so ashamed of myself. I just froze and watched these things, these monsters, attack us. Then one of them turned and bit me. It was then that another couple grabbed me and got me out of there. I pleaded with them to get my husband, but they said it was too late for him. I didn’t want to leave him, ya know? When you see your family being killed in front of your eyes, you just want to do anything you can to save them, even if it means dying with them.”
“Cate, I’m so sorry about what happened to you and your family. Did you ever see them again?”
“No. That was the last time I saw Rob and his parents.”
“Were you able to find out any information? Do you know what happened to them?”
“No. I-I didn’t get any information. And I still don’t know…” she begins to cry. “I don’t know what happened to them. I guess they’re all dead or zombies now. I don’t know. I just don’t know.”
“That must have been horrible.”
“It was. And I can’t get it out of my head. Every time I close my eyes, it’s like it happens all over again. When I’m awake, I feel guilty for surviving. At night when I try to sleep, I relive what happened. Every time I struggle to do something different in my dreams, but it always ends the same way.”
“Did you say one of them bit you?”
“Yeah, but this couple injected me with something. They said it was a serum to help slow down the virus or something like that. Things happened
so quickly, I can’t remember much of anything else, but I thank God for them because I haven’t turned, at least not yet.”
“If you haven’t turned, why are you still here? Shouldn’t they have let you go by now?”
“Well, things are sometimes touch and go. One day I feel OK, then the next I can’t breathe and I’m sweating. Every time I feel like things are going well, they give me another dose of something and I get worse. For now, they said I’m here for my own safety, but when I’m completely cured, they said they’d let me go.”
“That seems to be a common promise they make around here,” I mumble under my breath. “When you’re feeling better, why do you let them inject you with anything else?”
“The doctors here tell me if I skip a dose, I may relapse and I don’t want that. I don’t want to turn into a zombie.”
“Right, but if the treatments make you sick, why not just decline them when you’re feeling good and see how things go?”
“I don’t know. I never thought about it. I guess I can do that next time. If you don’t mind me asking, why are you here? Are you infected?”
“I was infected a long time ago, but not anymore. I’m here because… uh… because…”
“Yes? Because?”
“Because some bad people kidnapped my husband and are using him to hold me here. They want to experiment on me.”
“Oh my God. That’s terrible.”
“I know. That’s why I mentioned it. Cate, I know you don’t want to hear this, but it sounds like they’re experimenting on you too, and it’s not right.”
“These are good people, Jane. They just want to help me.”
“Are you sure about that?”
“Well, yes. Err, at least, I hope so. Anyway, what can we do? We’re stuck in here.”
“Yeah, that’s a problem. I’ll have to think about it.”
“Jane.”
“Yeah?”
“Can I tell you something?”
“Of course.”
“Promise you won’t tell anybody?”
“I promise.”
“You swear?”
