Of Sudden Origin

by C. Chase Harwood

  Ridley took this in and then said, “I didn’t shit myself and I am a soldier.”

  “Bitch, you’re not a soldier ‘til you’ve seen the elephant. You missed it. Too worried about crapping your pants.”

  “That’s not tru–-“

  “Shut it.” For the first time in the conversation, Wilson turned and looked Ridley in the eye. It was so dark that they could barely see each other so Wilson turned on his red filtered flashlight. “I don’t like being up here with you Ridley. Not ‘cause it’s raining like a motherfucker, but because boys who shit themselves in the face of the enemy get their buddies killed.”

  Ridley stared back at him and finally said, “I’m not your buddy.”

  “Sure you are, Cherry Bitch. If you’re not my buddy, then you’re my enemy – and you’ll have to watch your back.”

  Ken kept his mouth shut after that. Deep down, he knew Wilson was right. He’d choked. He’d held onto the fifty-cal like it was some kind of life preserver. He froze and he didn’t know why. He had expected it to be like a video game – blowing away zombies – it was nothing like a video game.

  A little later the radio squawked. It was Tyler Preston who had volunteered to keep watch down route 16 at the Henderson farm. He’d been having a grand old time calling in: ‘The flies er comin to the web’, as he described the refugees heading north.

  “Motherfucking fuck! Someone got their ears on? Come back?”

  Ken picked up the radio. “Go ahead, Tyler.”

  “Fucking, holy fuck! Coming in the door! Fuck yo –“

  The sound of gunfire – a brief handful of shots echoed from a distance, then nothing. Ken’s radio howled with static and he twisted the squelch knob to stop it. “Tyler, come in. You’ve got Private Ridley here. Come in?”

  “Whoa, that dude is getting his,” said Wilson.

  “Maybe the storm - screwing with the atmospherics. He’s getting trigger happy?”

  “Get real - you heard that same as me. Fuckin’ crazy motherfucker‘s toast.”

  Then they heard a distant jingle of shaking chain link.

  “Hmm, now that’s interesting,” said Wilson. Throwing his hood over his head, he moved to the edge of the roof and peered out. It was nearly pitch black. His flashlight burned through maybe twenty feet of it. He turned and stomped on a switch that lit up the floodlights lined up across the top of the building. The rain and fog was too dense. In fact the brightness of the lights made things worse, the reflection killing his night vision. He could just barely make out the ghostly image of the power line tower fifty feet away. He stomped on the switch again. Then he heard the chain link again. “Either the fuckers are trying to get out or Deadhead’s are comin’ in.” He turned to Ridley, “Can’t see jack. You’re going to have to go downstairs and walk over there.”

  “Okay. But why can’t we both go?”

  “Cause I know how to fire the fifty, you green panty-waste. Now be a man and get the fuck down there.”

  Ken’s soaking wet boots squeaked on the concrete floor as he crossed through the main room. If he ignored all of the dead power equipment, the place really was like some medieval castle. The new residents had used the big room that night for a banquet, celebrating their new digs. They’d gotten rip-roaring drunk and then crashed on sleeping mats all over the floor. To the private’s astonishment, Major Deighton was passed out on some kind of head table with a woman curled up under his arm. He desperately didn’t want to wake the man if this was a false alarm. The major’s wrath was always brutal. He’d be cleaning the latrine for week if he blew it.

  The room was full of loud snoring and he could hear at least two different couples quietly fucking somewhere among the slumbering crowd. Ken couldn’t believe his crappy luck as he went through a small entry foyer - pulling watch on this of all nights. He quietly unbolted the steel outer door and stepped outside.

  The ground was saturated and he cursed as his right boot sunk into a puddle that was higher than his ankle. He swept the flashlight back and forth close to the ground until he’d found the clearly marked path that led past the mines to the prisoner cage. The cattle ramp/drawbridge completed the castle image in his mind - World goes to shit and somehow we embrace the dark ages. He felt bad for the folks in the cage, and frankly didn’t understand the major’s mindset on keeping them locked up like that. Why not just let them go if they didn’t want to fight? If folks wanted to bug out north, why shouldn’t they? It wasn’t like they had signed a contract with the Army like he had. Keeping them as bait – well that was breaking the law. The country still needed laws.

  As he got closer, he could hear the fence jingling with what could only be the weight of people climbing. He thought, Damn if those folks aren’t trying to get out. I sure as shit don’t want to have to shoot somebody.

  He reached the gate for the barbwire perimeter fence, removed the padlock and swung the gate open. The shaking sound of chain link unnerved him as he stepped up to the cattle ramp and kicked the chock that was holding it up. The cable that held it spun out quickly as the heavy ramp swung down and landed on the opposite side of the moat. He brought his rifle to shoulder height like he’d been trained and stepped out to the ramp’s center, keeping the flashlight held along the barrel of his gun. The edge of the beam caught something in the moat. It was a body, no, make that bodies floating face down. Then he saw more struggling in the water. He aimed toward the cage and saw Kathy with her crutches laying on the ground. She was trying to climb one of the transformers in the center. White with fear, she squinted at Ken’s light and let out a silent cry. Several Fiends finished crawling over others that were trapped in barbed wire and jumped inside. They raced for Kathy.

  Just before his bowels let go for real this time, Ken swept the water around him again. He locked eyes with a Fiend who was using its drowned brethren to pull itself up onto the ramp. Another climbed out of the water on the castle side, blocking his escape. Ken raised his gun and slammed it into the Fiend, knocking it back in the water. The thing pulled the rifle from his hands as it fell. He didn’t look back and ran for his life.

  As he sprinted, he could feel his shit tumbling down his legs, getting trapped where his pants were tucked into his boots, and he found himself laughing with hysteria at the absurdity of it – the extra weight around his ankles. He knew exactly where to go and charged right past the power plant to the lakeshore. In one quick move, he flipped over one of the canoes and started to launch it. A small part of his mind registered that a few canoes were missing, but that was quickly swept away by his sheer panic. He got a leg in the boat just as the first ghoul came running at him. He swung the heavy flashlight into the monster’s neck, crushing its Adam’s apple and dropping the thing to its knees. He shoved off as best he could and paddled with adrenaline-charged strength, pulling quickly away from the shore as more of them crashed into the water.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  The Floodgate

  PFC Wilson watched through the deluge as Ken’s flashlight bobbed along back toward the castle. The kid was moving at a pretty good clip. He peered over the side and was astonished to see Ridley run right past the open door. He pointed his own light into the gloom and called down to the useless cherry fucker, but got no response. Three-seconds later, a man in tattered clothes ran past in hot pursuit, then another and another. A fourth looked up and saw Jeremy, and then Jeremy knew he was screwed.

  Ken paddled with all his might until he was sure he was over deep water then stopped. The canoe made a graceful crescent-shaped turn back toward shore and he watched the rain-filled sky turn orange from the bright flash of Wilson’s fifty-cal. The concussion from the big gun echoed across the lake, vibrating the very seat of his canoe. As he sat without noticing his own filth, he could see dozens of Deadheads backlit on the shore. Then his eyes grew even larger, and he took a sharp breath – they were pouring through the door – the door that he had left open. He heard screams come from within, and the sound of several guns j
oining the fight. The flash from the fifty joined with the even brighter flashes of tripped anti-personnel mines, which lit up hundreds and hundreds more infected as they poured into the compound. He had opened the gate from hell and let the demons march right through.

  Seventeen minutes earlier, when the first Fiend had started to climb the cage, Jon and Nikki hadn’t hesitated. They each climbed one of the two dead transformers and tried to pull themselves up using the cable above while walking on the one below. With the rain, the cables might as well have been sheathed in ice, cold hands offering little grip. Nikki quickly slid off her belt and looped it around the cable above her, then wrapped her fists in the ends and pulled the looped section tight. By doing this she was able to pull herself forward, and with a quick release, slide, grab again, and pull herself up. Her feet slipped, but her grip on the belt didn’t. Jon tried the same trick and had the same success. It was slow going, but they were making progress. The other prisoners piled up against each other to be next.

  Acting as the gatekeeper, Will said, “Quick now. Everybody up. No time to lose.”

  Miraculously, everyone owned a belt except for Ingrid who had been wearing a dress the day they stuck her in the cage.

  Will grabbed a fallen blanket and climbed up to the cables. He twisted the threadbare cloth around the upper one and gave it a tug. He handed the woman his belt. “Use mine, Ingrid. This blanket seems to do the trick.” He spoke with a smile in his voice and for Ingrid, it was both remarkable and unsettling.

  Kathy was last. She stood upon her crutches and smiled weakly at Will. “Go,” she said.

  “Kathy,” he admonished, panic overtaking his cheerful cadence.

  She looked over her shoulder into the gloom. The fencing was alive with grunting humans. “You wouldn’t know anything about breaking necks would you, Will? You could kill me quick.”

  “Try climbing.”

  He helped her up onto the transformer base and she got her belt around the cable. She pulled herself up a few feet but her legs just didn’t have the strength or balance and she slipped and fell back into his arms.

  “Here, climb on my back.”

  She did her best, but her hip made it hard to hold on with her legs. Will tried to climb, but her weight was too much. He simply couldn’t pull them both up. She cried out as she loosened her grip. Will begged, "Hold tight!"

  “Oh, Will. Oh, God. God, help me.” She let go, dropping back to the ground with a thud, losing her wind.

  Will looked down, released his belt, and started to climb down for her. “I’m coming. Hang on!”

  She got her breath back. “No, you go!”

  He hesitated. The pause allowed the sound of the climbing killers to be firmly drilled into their heads.

  “Go for God’s sake!”

  He closed his eyes for a second and then without looking back at her, renewed his climb.

  Jon took his eyes off Nikki’s back. They were almost to the top of the first tower, and he looked over his shoulder during a lighting flash. In that blink of a moment he counted only Nancy Green, Loren Haymaker, Doctor Smith, David Miller and just barely, Ingrid the mousy woman. He had to assume that the rest were coming. At this point, everyone was on their own.

  Beyond this first tower there was a sudden spread in the distance between the cable above and the one they were walking on. The one above was now out of reach, making it impossible to continue in the fashion that Nikki had worked out. At least this tower was within the compound, the base only thirty or so yards from the power plant. As Jon joined Nikki on the tower railings, she panted, “We’ll have to climb down. Try to steal a boat.” She then began to work her way down the slippery rails. The night was so dark that there was no seeing the ground. They could hear the Fiends though. The chain link fence was singing its own tortured tune.

  They were perhaps half way down when there was a slight gentle yelp and tall skinny Loren Haymaker flew past them having slipped on a wet rail. His body hit another rail below them and then spun crazily in the dark until there was a wet thump.

  Big Patricia Gould was struggling valiantly to get her heft up the cable while bawling over her plight, her tears quickly swept away in the heavy torrent. Will caught up to her in moments. The angle was simply too much for her, and her feet kept slipping. Will goaded her, “Come on Pat. You’re a strong woman. Keep going. Pull yourself up.”

  Patricia stopped instead and simply shook her head while holding on with a death grip. There was no way for Will to pass her. He had to get her to move. He reared one leg back and gave her a hard kick in the ass. It was like kicking sand. She didn’t even flinch. He whispered loudly in her ear, “Patricia Gould, move your ass or you’ll kill us both!”

  Then both of them felt more than heard a buzzing sound in their heads – sudden disorientation – the sense that the infected were all around them – mud under their feet – grunting humans – strong smells. Patricia involuntarily let go to put her hands over her ears. She turned as she fell. Lightning struck and she locked eyes with Will before landing in a heaving mound of screaming humans. Just as suddenly, Will’s head cleared. “What the hell?” The roar from below got him moving again.

  Nancy Green was acrophobic. She had climbed up the cable without a second thought - fear of getting eaten alive overcoming any fear of heights, but now she was on the tower within the safety of the compound and she watched one by one as Nikki then Jon, Paul, Ingrid and David worked their way down. She heard rather than saw Loren fall; the sudden intake of breath, the sickening sound of flesh and bone careening off steel girders.

  Will reached her, his breath coming in great gasps, “Where are the others?”

  She pointed down without looking.

  “Got it. Patricia and Kathy aren’t coming. I’m last. Go.”

  “You go ahead, Will. I’ve got to rest a moment.”

  “Come on, Nancy. Get going. We’ve already lost two.”

  “I’ll be right behind you. Just please, let me rest a moment.”

  “I’ll stay with you.”

  “Will! Go!” she whispered loudly.

  “Okay. Please don’t wait long. There’s no time.” Without another word, he began to climb down.

  Nancy had decided to stay. She really was tired: tired of being afraid, tired of running, tired of being tired. The survivors below waited a full minute for her, but when the guard had stepped out of the bunker and headed for the cage - nearly walking right past them - they didn’t wait another moment. There was no choice but to move on.

  When dawn broke over Flagstaff Lake, those Fiends who weren’t feasting on or infecting the castle residents - or blowing themselves up by setting off mines - stared up at Nancy Green like ravenous hyenas. Her muscles were all one great cramp as she clung to the frigid steel, the sense of touch having left her fingers and toes hours before.

  The rain had tapered off to a light mist and she could see for at least a mile. The infected were everywhere. It was like watching a great migration as hills and valleys became black with tattered, hungry looking wraiths.

  When she finally decided that she couldn’t hold on any longer, she pried her fingers from the steel, forced her fingers to painfully bend, and carefully took off her prized Patagonia Jacket. Her daughter Piper had given it to her the previous Christmas, when the world had mostly been as she’d known it – mundane and safe in easy suburbia.

  Piper, her son Taylor and her husband Cal were all gone now. At least that’s how she thought of them. She couldn’t bear the reality that they were just as likely running mad across the countryside killing and eating people.

  All three had contracted the infection at the hospital where they’d been sent. Cal had lost control of their mini-van on an icy road just a mile from their Maryland home. Ironically, they were on their way back from a seminar on Cain’s survival. Nancy had chosen not to go, she had been feeling under the weather and didn’t want to get anyone ill.

  The previous morning, the hospital had
received a group of sickened train passengers who had arrived from down south somewhere. It turned out that they were carrying the disease. The hospital was a massacre. Her attempts to get there and save her family were thwarted by roadblocks in every direction. Within a day the entire county was a contamination zone. She was evacuated to New York and never saw her family again.

  Nancy took another quick glance at the ground below, her stomach twisting over the height, dizziness overtaking her. She spotted something curious among the mass of Fiends below her. A female was holding an infant to her breast. There was something odd looking about the child; it was feeding as any other baby might, the female holding it with care, but…. The female looked up and caught Nancy’s eye and then laughed in the horrific way that Fiends do. The child let go of the teat and looked up as well. Nancy’s blood ran cold. “Oh my God.”

  The child’s eyes were just as wicked, but they were also huge with big black irises – twice as big as a normal baby. Its overly large ears tapered slightly at the tips and pointed forward at the sound of her voice. Nancy suddenly experienced a sensation like nothing she’d ever felt before: Her mind’s eye was filled with the presence of another – like a second conscience communicating to her – it was incomprehensible – a series of images – horrible images, blood and guts and screaming and laughing and crying and then that mother’s face down there, close up, looking into her eyes, but not her eyes, and the swell of the mother’s teat, and Nancy could taste – she could taste the unique flavor of mother’s milk in her mouth. Nancy screamed at this invasion of her mind.

  Two wretched looking twin females watched the mother and child. A rudimentary element of their original bond had been retained since their infection and they hadn’t separated since. They had been tracking the mother and her newborn for days… Not fair, they both thought. Want the infant Other that finds food better than any of the Others. They were tired of the hunger and they watched with envy the female Other that held the baby. She always found food first, leaving nothing for them, the little one able to keep them away – making their heads hurt. One got a running start, followed quickly by her sister, and snatched the infant off the mother’s teat – then running, running through the mass of infected, and escaping up along the edge of the lake.