by Cronan, Matt
The Infected
Matt Cronan
Copyright 2016 by Matthew Cronan
PART ONE: NEW HOPE
1
Alarms blared overhead as dozens of people crowded together on either side of the laundry facility. A handful of soldiers scrambled back and forth, securing the room's steel doors. Their shouts meshed with the sobs and pleas of panicked workers, creating a discordant orchestra of chaos.
Samantha Albright and Rebecca Young huddled against the wall at the forefront of the crowd. The overhead fluorescents gleamed in Rebecca's wide blue eyes as tears spilled down her cheeks. Sam knelt, so that she was eye-level with the little girl and grasped her by the shoulders.
"What's happening?" Rebecca asked. Her high-pitched voice wavered when she spoke, and Sam struggled to maintain her composure.
"You know what's happening," Sam said. "They've breached the walls."
"It's not a drill?"
"No. It's not a drill."
"Will everything be okay?"
"Yes."
"How do you know?"
"I just do."
Across from them, an old woman clutched a cross in a wrinkled fist and whispered prayers to it. Sam wanted to tell her not to waste her breath. God had stopped listening to them a long time ago. Instead, she looked back to Rebecca, offered the child a confident smile, and wiped her wet cheeks with the soiled sleeve of her coverall.
Outside the facility, a round of gunfire burst through the air and Sam pulled Rebecca to her knees. She grabbed the girl's small hands and squeezed them tight as she fought back her own urges to cry. She hadn't cried since coming to New Hope. That had been a decade ago. Her eyes stung as the backlog of tears threatened to spill over. She pulled Rebecca closer and kissed her on the top of her head.
"It'll be okay," Sam said.
"You promise?"
"I promise." She tried to sound strong, tried to speak in measured tones, but her trembling voice betrayed her.
Two soldiers ran past and positioned themselves at either side of the main entrance. The one on the left side of the door shouted commands to his partner. The patch on his breast pocket had the name 'Horn' stitched onto it. His face was grizzled and hardened.
The other soldier's name was Dennis Freeman. He was 19—five years younger than Sam—and had lived in the same region before the outbreak. His baby-face was far less menacing than Horn's gruff appearance and his finger twitched as it lay against the trigger. Freeman's presence didn't instill the same level of confidence as Horn's.
"I don't want to die," Rebecca said.
"We're not going to—"
Sam's wavering promise was interrupted as a man crashed through the window in the front of the room. Screams erupted from the crowd as the body convulsed on the ground. The man wore the same fatigues as Freeman and Horn. Blood spewed from a gaping wound in the man's neck and showered the left side of the room.
Sam's heart seized as the hot blood splattered across her face. Her eyes slammed shut and her lips pinched together. She let go of Rebecca's hand and wiped the blood from her face with the sleeve of her coverall—careful not to let any get in her mouth, nose or eyes.
Rebecca let out a stifled yelp and Sam's eyes shot open. Her heart lurched at the sight of the little girl doused in crimson. The whites of her eyes were red. Blood covered every entry point. For one long second, Sam sat frozen and horror.
"Sam?"
Sam pressed her sleeve to the girl's face and wiped it away, as she struggled to take a breath.
"It's okay," Sam said. "It's not bad at all."
Rebecca answered with a sob.
The man who had crashed through the window stopped convulsing and lay still. Sam held her breath as the two soldiers took a tentative step toward him. Suddenly, the man shot to his feet. Sam caught the briefest glimpse of his milky-white eyes. He was no longer a man. No longer a living, breathing soul. He was infected.
"What are you waiting for?" Horn screamed as he lifted his rifle.
It was too late.
An inhuman scream ripped through the room and Sam's skin erupted in gooseflesh. A guttural growl followed the scream and the infected man lunged at Freeman. The young soldier tried to backpedal and fired two blind shots as he did. They missed wide and lodged into the wall above the crowd on the right side of the room. The infected man grabbed ahold of Freeman's field jacket and sunk his teeth deep within the soldier's neck. The two collapsed to the ground, and Sam heard the bone-chilling sound of flesh ripping from the young man's throat. Freeman managed a scream which devolved into a nauseating gurgle. Two more gunshots tore through the room and both the infected man and Freeman stopped moving.
Horn's eyes were wide and his skin was ashen. His eyes swept the gruesome scene on the floor and then darted to the group of onlookers covered in blood. He hesitated for the briefest moment and then pulled a white lever next to the door. Sprinklers emerged from the ceiling and drenched the room.
The alarms stopped a few minutes after the shooting. Three Ministry buses idled outside the facility within an hour of the incident. The soldiers forced everyone onto the buses and sent them to the Infection Control Center for testing. The ICC resided in the center of New Hope within spitting distance of the capital building.
Sam covered her eyes as she exited the bus. The pale sun hung high in the air as the group trotted from the bus to the lobby of the small building. She savored the few seconds of warmth it provided before entering through the two glass doors.
Sam took her place in line with the rest of the workers from laundry. They had been exposed to contaminated blood and the ICC would examine them at extensive lengths before rejoining the population. Rebecca stood in front of her. The young girl shivered and clutched her stomach.
"I'm infected," Rebecca whispered as they moved a step forward.
"No you're not." Sam kept her voice low as a soldier walked past them.
"Okay."
"Do you believe me?"
"No."
Sam started to say something but her words fell short. Instead, she squeezed the girl's shoulders, hoping to give her a little comfort. The shaking assuaged, and the girl took a deep breath.
"Next," a voice said. It belonged to a squat woman with short silver hair who sat at a desk at the front of the line. Two soldiers armed with automatic rifles stood behind her on opposite sides of a steel door. They wore stoic expressions but their eyes darted from side to side—scanning for anyone that displayed symptoms of infection.
Roger Farris, a gaunt man in his late sixties, moved from the head of the line to the woman's desk and sat down in the metal chair. Everyone in line took one silent step forward as Roger pressed his face against the retina scanner mounted on the desk. A couple dozen people separated Sam and Rebecca from the woman at the desk.
The testing wasn't new to any of them. Every Friday, the ICC selected a large group of citizens and brought them to the quarantine center. The workers drew their blood and scanned their retinas. Their vitals taken and recorded. In the ten years Sam lived in New Hope, there had never been a breach and no one had ever tested positive.
"No!" Roger screamed. "That's not right." He clambered to his feet and the metal chair flew back and clanked against the concrete floor. The two soldiers approached him, their guns raised and aimed. A third soldier emerged from the rear of the line. Sam's heartbeat quickened and her breath caught in her chest. More soldiers came from the door beyond the silver-haired woman's desk and swarmed upon him.
It took less than ten seconds to secure the man and drag him through the doorway. The heavy metal door slammed shut, but Sam could still hear Roger's muffled screams
. A single gunshot echoed beyond the door. And then there was silence.
Before Sam reached the front of the line, the soldiers had taken three more people to the room beyond the desk. Gary DeLaney, Maria Gomez and… Rebecca Young.
They carried the young girl away as she pled for someone to save her. Sam screamed for them to stop and tried to pry Rebecca from their arms. One soldier broke from the group and pinned Sam against the wall.
The small girl clawed at the doorframe as tears poured from her clouded eyes. And then she was gone. Her small body disappeared behind the veil of darkness and the door swung shut. The soldier let go and Sam collapsed to her knees.
"She's a child for god's sake," Sam cried. "You can't—"
The report of the gunshot interrupted her and a gut-wrenching scream burst from Sam's throat. The world blurred and grew distorted. She didn't notice the soldier's hands forcing her to the ground or the pinprick of the needle as it punctured her skin. The light faded from her eyes and darkness swallowed her.
2
The tallest skyscraper on the horizon erupted in brilliant colors of yellow and orange. The flames danced hypnotically as they climbed to the apex of the building and spread to the monoliths surrounding it. Thick dark smoke wafted up from the towering infernos and disappeared into the pitch-black sky above.
Sam stood in a field of unkempt grass and watched the city burn. Long before the outbreak, she had played freeze-tag and hide-and-seek in this field with a boy named David. Before the quarantines. Before the infected stalked the ruins and wastes of the broken world.
The boy lay at her feet, unmoving. His clothes had been torn off of him and on his chest the number zero was seared into his skin. Sam knelt beside him, but when she did, the boy's body disappeared. She ran her hand over the mashed-down grass and felt the warm ground.
Sam stood and turned around. Hundreds of faceless onlookers stood behind her as the enormous blaze swallowed the city. The air grew heavy with ash and soot and Sam tore at the neck of her sweater in a frantic attempt to draw breath. The smoke was suffocating her. She turned around to see if anyone else was affected but the crowd had vanished. A single person remained.
Rebecca Young stood in the center of the field and stared back at her. The girl's pink skin had turned a sickly sallow shade, and the moon gleamed in the milky-whites of her eyes. Sam's heart raced in her chest as the two girls stared at each other in silence. Then the little girl screamed the same inhuman scream as the man who had infected her and a deep chill ran down Sam's spine. And then Rebecca, the girl who Sam loved so much, who she thought of as her baby sister, lunged at her.
Sam woke up screaming. She sprung to her feet and clawed at the empty air. It took a few seconds to realize she was in her own room and safe. And a few seconds more to remember that Rebecca was dead. She had no memory after the execution.
Her eyes scanned the darkened room as her heart continued to slam against her chest and each beat echoed the fear of the nightmare. The fear of seeing Rebecca as an infected. She swallowed hard and the acid filling her stomach burned her insides raw. Outside it was still dark, but Sam had no intention of going back to sleep. Her eyes landed on a handwritten note lying on the small table in the corner.
She crossed the room and picked up the note. Her hands trembled as she struggled to unfold it. The handwriting of the dozen or so words was familiar, and the fear abated as the pain and agony of Rebecca's loss washed over her.
Dax from laundry called me and I brought you home. I'm sorry about Rebecca.
Remember the flowers.
-Jordan
She sat back down on the bed and stared at the note. Cold sweat soaked the sheets, and she noticed the stretched collar of her night shirt. She fingered the scratch marks on her throat and they glistened red when she withdrew them. She wiped them on the white linen and then stared at the crimson spot for a long time. Sam thought of Rebecca and the others and wept until daybreak.
She crawled out of bed when sunlight peeked through the sheer curtain hanging over the lone window in the small room. Her apartment was less than 300 square feet and consisted of two rooms: the main room—that operated as a kitchen, a dining room and a bedroom—and her bathroom. There was no closet, but she didn't have enough belongings to warrant extra storage space. The twin-sized bed, the monitor, the rundown appliances, along with the shelving and fixtures belonged to the Ministry. She could fit everything that she owned into a small suitcase and still have space leftover.
Sam brewed a cup of coffee and sat down at the small corner table. She gripped the ceramic mug in her hands and took a sip of the hot bitter drink. She had hoped the coffee would warm the ice-cold numbness residing inside of her. So far it hadn't. Deep down, she knew it wouldn't. There wasn't enough coffee in the world to fix a broken heart.
The clock continued to move, and when the hour hand found the seven, she took a deep breath and rose from the table to get ready for work. She forced herself into the bathroom and stripped herself of the ragged night shirt. Ice-cold water drizzled down from the rusted showerhead, offering no comfort from the chill in her bones. Then she toweled off, returned to the living area and plucked a pair of coveralls from the dresser. She would have to replace the ones from yesterday.
After she dressed, she picked up the porcelain hairbrush resting on the top of the dresser and dragged the bristles through her long brown hair. The hairbrush was one of the few items she owned outright and one of the few that had escaped the fire. She couldn't remember why she had chosen to bring the hairbrush of all things but she had blocked a lot of the past from her mind.
An alarm sounded and Sam screamed as images of Rebecca's milky-white eyes flooded her mind. She collapsed to the ground and covered her ears. Every muscle in her body trembled with fear and her mind raced at the thought of another breach. The last ten years had been quiet. Too quiet.
Two more ear-piercing bleats followed the first and then a woman's voice came over the intercom. "Attention. Attention. All citizens of New Hope are required to report to the town square at once. This is an official request from the Ministry."
The dread gripping Sam's body eased, and her muscles relaxed. She took a deep breath and got to her feet. She chortled at the gross overreaction to the alarm and caught a glimpse of her reflection. The smile looked foreign on her thin face and its appearance so soon after Rebecca's death disgusted her. The smile faded, and she turned from the mirror. She slipped on her work shoes, zipped up the coveralls, pulled her hair into a ponytail and exited her apartment.
A handful of girls sped toward the stairs at the end of the narrow hallway. The Ministry didn't consider the elevators a necessity and had disabled them. It made the apartments on the lower floors a premium option but no one paid for housing. The citizens worked 70 hours a week and in return the Ministry provided food, clothing and shelter.
Casey Morrison, a red-headed girl that lived two apartments down, bumped into her and offered a quick apology as she continued toward the exit. The Ministry had segregated the single males from the single females, and provided separate housing for couples on the opposite side of the city.
She entered the stairwell last and descended the concrete steps. The footsteps below grew fainter and fainter until hers was the only ones left. It took several minutes to descend the 18 floors to the lobby. She wasn't in a hurry and didn't care if her tardiness upset the Ministry. She didn't care about a lot of things anymore.
By the time Sam reached the bottom of the stairwell and exited into the lobby, she was sure that she would be the last person left in the building. She was wrong. A tall boy her age stood by the revolving glass door.
"Jordan," she whispered.
Her heart skipped a beat at the sight of him and again when he smiled. Bright spots came few and far between after the outbreak, but Jordan was one of them. The weight of Rebecca's death lifted just enough to smile back.
"Thought I was going to have to come get you," he said.
; "Sorry," she said.
She crossed the room and wrapped her thin arms around his neck. He responded with a bear hug of his own. She tried to pull away, but he planted a kiss on her lips. Sam melted into his arms and kissed him back. For that short moment, everything was right with the world. Then she pulled away and shook her head.
"We can't," Sam said. "We'll get in trouble. We haven't told the Ministry. If they catch us, they'll throw us into the stockade."
Jordan didn't answer. He pulled her back into his embrace. She didn't stop him. Her cheek rubbed against his and the weeks' worth of stubble he sported scratched against her smooth skin. She didn't pull away from the pain. Instead, she savored the moment.
"I'm sorry about Rebecca."
"It should have been me."
Jordan shook his head. "It shouldn't have been either of you."
"They shot her, Jordan." Sam's voice shook as she said the words aloud. "I heard the gunshot. She was nine years old. She was a child."
Her voice broke, and the tears returned. She sobbed and her knees buckled. Jordan caught her as she fell and guided her to the ground. Sam pressed her head to his chest and balled her eyes out for what seemed like an eternity. Jordan held her close and stroked her hair.
She would have stayed there for the rest of the day if she had a choice but the siren overhead emitted three short bursts as it had before. The female voice boomed through the lobby and repeated the announcement from earlier.
"We need to go," Jordan said. He brushed the hair from her face and tucked it behind her ear.
Sam nodded.
Jordan got to his feet and helped Sam to hers. He wiped her face with his hand and kissed her forehead. She hugged him one more time, then took him by the hand and started toward the front doors. He stopped her right before she entered the turnstile.
"I love you, Samantha."
The ghost of her smile returned. "Remember the flowers."
3
They exited through the revolving door and headed toward the plaza in the center of the city. Sam guessed most of the citizens would already be at the square, but they watched as a few stragglers sprinted past them.
