Tony turned as he made his way down the narrow kitchen and asked, “Now there are nine?”
“Yeah, and more coming. I think the moaning is working as a kind of beacon for others.”
Rachel reeled back in her recliner and asked, “What the fuck did you just say? Sorry kids.”
Meghan answered, “It’s okay. They’re back in the bedroom sleeping.”
“Okay, then what the fuck did you just say?”
As usual, Jerry hesitated before he began. It was just difficult for him to commit himself to anything. Sticking his neck out in the past had gotten him nothing but trouble. And he wasn’t an expert. Just because he’d played some games, watched some movies, and read some books didn’t mean that he was some fucking Dr. Van Helsing of zombies. He was just a kid and wanted to go back to that. He always did. He missed not having to make decisions, or at least not having to be held terribly accountable for those decisions.
“I’m guessing that the noise has been there all along,” he said. “It was probably just subsonic because there weren’t enough of them yet. Or maybe it’s because the city is quieter. Whatever. It doesn’t really resemble a sound that I could place. It’s not really a sound at all. It’s more like a vibration than it is a sound. Can everyone else feel it?”
Meghan nodded her head, “Yeah, I think you’re right. It’s actually nauseating me a little.” She leaned toward Neil and rested against him. Tentatively, he raised his hand and wrapped it around her shoulders. She nestled into him in search of comfort.
“Well,” Jerry continued, “the vibrations were probably always there, it just took more of them to become powerful enough for our ears to detect it.”
Tony asked, already suspecting the answer, “Our ears? Aren’t they just us?”
“Yeah, but they died and came back and all the result of some kind of virus or some other highly transmittable organism. Who knows what all changes took place as a result of the infection? I think it is safe to assume that their senses are probably heightened.”
Kim, coming from the dining room where she had been a silent observer of the conversation thus far, asked, “Why do you say that?”
“Well, they’re predators now in a more primal and animalistic sense. They’re hunters and hunter species have long relied on their senses to detect, track, and ultimately kill their prey.”
“Us,” Meghan said soberly.
Neil asked the room, “What are we gonna do?”
Rachel, virtually melted to the fabric of her recliner so far she was sunken into the chair, answered, “Why the hell are you asking us? You’re the guy who’s had the answers all along. You tell us. What are we going to do?”
“I don’t know for sure, Rachel. I’m new at this too. I guess for the time being we just wait and see. We can afford to stall and not rush into things. Maybe time will work to our advantage.”
“And what do you mean by that?”
Looking up at him and smiling, Meghan asked, “Yeah, what’s runnin’ through that head of yours?”
Neil guided Meghan back into a standing position and stepped away for a second. “These things. They’re just dead bodies, right? Well, dead bodies rot. They decompose. Ashes to ashes and dust to dust. Maybe as that starts to happen, these things will start to slow down or give us some other sort of advantage. Maybe as their muscle tissue becomes tighter with water loss they’ll slow down…start acting like the zombies in the Romero movies. They were slow and usually overwhelmed victims through sheer numbers.”
Jerry interjected, “Yeah, you may be right. I guess I hope you’re right. I wonder how long until desiccation begins to take its toll. Do you think that their...um...feeding impacts the process?”
Rachel interrupted the discussion with a very direct, “What the fuck does it matter? You’re not gettin’ my ass back out there. And if the rest of you are smart, you’d just stay hidden too.”
She started to cry, which forced her words out in sputtering starts and stops. “I mean...does...does...any of...th-th-that even matter? Is...is this Armageddon?” The last word spilled from her lips and made its way through the room like a shadow, darkening as it crept.
She looked up from the floor and let the tears course down her cheeks. Her eyes were swollen and her cheeks were red and splotchy. She looked at Neil and asked, “Is this really the end of the world like in The Bible?”
To hear a question like that, one typically had to be walking in downtown San Francisco or some other larger than life metropolis, and the asker would be wearing a large cardboard sign written in scrawled marker with a date for the end of the world. It wasn’t a question that normally arose in casual conversation. Neil had read a story a long time ago in which everyone on Earth knew that the end of the world was happening that night after everyone was asleep. Even with that knowledge, the entire population simply went to sleep like normal, to never wake again. That was really the first time he had truly contemplated the end of existence. He read the story in a college class. The discussion that followed culminated in an examination of what each of them would do today if they knew that tomorrow would never come.
And now here it was; a very real possibility that he was living that exact scenario. Ain’t life a bitch? he thought to himself. I’ve actually met someone that it feels natural to connect with so well, so quickly, and time has run out. He looked at Meghan. He knew that everyone in the room was looking at him again, but he didn’t care. He needed to know if he was just imagining the energy between them. Maybe he was just creating the illusion to comfort his mind. When he looked in her eyes though, he realized it didn’t really matter because she was looking at him and her eyes were kind and warm and comfortable.
If it was the end of the world, he couldn’t think of a better feeling to have when it all shook down. He didn’t feel the need to answer Rachel immediately. He did, however, look away from Meghan and felt better than he had in a long time.
Meghan looked over at Rachel and said, “I’m not necessarily saying that I even believe in that line of thinking, but, regardless, I’m not goin’ down without a fight. Don’t expect me to pray for salvation and ditch on this world. I say let’s figure a way outta this. If we wait, then we wait. And if we need to figure out when and how to boogey, well I’m down with that too. We just all need to keep talkin’ and thinkin’ and watchin’ out for one another.”
Neil interrupted, “First things first. It feels a little cool in here today.”
Tony, still in the dining room, said, “Yeah, the turtle thermostat hanging on the window here says that it’s only fifty degrees outside.”
“And it’s only gonna get cooler.”
“Whatdawe do?”
Neil didn’t know. If they were to survive, they needed to stay warm. But they also couldn’t risk detection by those things.
To the room, but more specifically to Jerry, he asked, “Do ya think that smoke from a fire would give us away?”
Tony, with a smile on his face, jokingly said, “Maybe if ours isn’t the only fire...”
Meghan and Kim both looked at him and said in unison, “Huh?”
“Well, I’m a bit of a pyro, and if it would help I might be willing to venture out and start us a fire down the road a bit.”
Kim demanded, “Are you outta your fucking mind!”
“C’mon, Kim. You know how much of a pyro I am. Here’s my big chance to start a real fire and not get in trouble for it...hell, even be encouraged to set it. You tellin’ me that you want me to pass that kind of an opportunity by?”
“Yeah, but that doesn’t mean ya gotta get yourself killed to satisfy your fetish. ‘Sides, we don’t even know if this is gonna work.”
“Relax, I’ll be safe. It’s not like I wanna die or anything.”
With that comment, Neil was suddenly reminded of the facetious rule that he would demand be followed in athletic contests, however mundane they may have been. ‘No one is allowed to die’ was the largely comedic rule that all at once becam
e much more profound. The words, as bright and buzzing as neon, flashed in his head, threatening to become a motivational mantra.
Ignoring the neon, Neil said, “She’s right, Tony. This isn’t worth getting yourself killed over. We can probably think of something else. This was really only going to buy us some time anyway and that was only if it worked.”
“If I thought I could actually end up dead doing this, d’ya think that I’d be volunteering?”
Kim started to speak, but thought better of it and went back into the bedroom in which Jules and Danny were still sleeping.
With his hands pressed tightly together in front of himself, Neil began, “Okay, let’s come up with a plan then. Any ideas?”
Chapter 36
Crouched and moving with as much speed as stealth would allow, Neil made it to the storage shed in the back of the yard. Just as Jerry had said, there was a grass caked red lawnmower. He looked around in the obscuring darkness and finally found it. He grabbed the metal handle on the gas can and was relieved to find that it was mostly full. Lugging it back to Tony, waiting by the six-foot privacy fence separating this yard from the next one, he tried not to cause the flammable liquid to slosh too much. But like a fart in church, he imagined that everyone and everything in the vicinity could hear it.
He reached the fence. “Okay, we ready to go?”
Tony nodded and smiled. They both looked up at Jerry standing at the ready on the deck behind them. From his vantage point, he could pretty well see into all the yards around them. He lifted the scoped hunting rifle above his head as he had seen soldiers do in World War II movies. Without lowering the rifle, he gave them a thumbs up signal and waved them over.
Meghan was there with Jerry as well. She waved to Neil and then blew him a kiss. She looked over them and into the yard to which they were heading. It was still empty, or at least it appeared empty. She couldn’t see the spaces close to the fence, the far side of the yard behind the shed and full tree, and, of course, the shadows in the house were a terrifying possibility to all of them. She didn’t see Neil and Tony go over the fence. She did, however, see both sets of hands come to the top of the fence and pull the ladder over.
Chapter 37
Reaching up to pull the ladder from the fence, Neil involuntarily withdrew his hands as if he had been burned. The cocktail of adrenaline and fear was forcing his hands into shaking fits that could rival a Parkinson’s tic. He was afraid that he might rattle the metal parts of their fence-scaling ladder they’d found hanging on the inside wall of the garage. They couldn’t afford the attention that such noise might bring.
Tony looked out into the new yard. “I’m scared shitless,” he whispered.
Neil’s heart was threatening to use his throat as an expressway as it made its way up and out his mouth. He swallowed cautiously, not wanting to tempt fate. At the back of his throat, a not too subtle pungence arose and settled in his mouth...the flavor of fear.
Neil whispered, “Speed. The quicker we get in, the quicker we get out. I don’t know about you, but I want to be back in our house as quick as we can.”
“I’m with you, boss.”
They started to run, one at each end of the ladder. They realized at the same tune that the yard they were in was not entirely enclosed. There were only fences on three sides, the front open to the street. They both stopped, looked at the empty street in front of the house, looked at one another, and decided to finish the job anyway. The absence of any of those things helped to embolden their resolve.
Tony clamored over the ladder and Neil quickly followed. This was the yard and this was the house. There was a big pile of firewood stacked against the back wall of the house. Without even seeing his face, Neil could feel Tony’s delightful smile.
Chapter 38
Meghan looked over at Jerry when she saw the smoke coming from two houses over. In another life, seeing smoke would have had her running to the telephone to call the fire department. It would have drawn a crowd of concerned neighbors to the street; it would have normally solicited a response other than relief and hope. Jerry’s own expression mirrored hers.
She looked past him, hoping to see Neil coming over the fence. “Oh shit!”
Jerry started to ask but then looked for himself. One of the ghouls, what appeared to be a former grocery clerk, was stumbling into the backyard that was between Neil and Tony and themselves. Its left leg was obviously broken and partially missing. It hopped on its good leg and used the damaged limb to balance itself precariously between jumps. Like a movie mummy’s tattered linen rags, the fiend’s shredded clothing hung from it, swaying with each uneven movement.
Like stone golems, Jerry and Meghan froze. Neither knew if the thing recognized them for what they were. Was it scent or movement that attracted the attention? Jerry had wondered to himself if the zombies might be able to detect heat signatures using an animalistic form of infrared. Bats used a sophisticated but natural form of sonar to navigate the blackness of night. Who’s to say that the infection that caused reanimation didn’t alter the senses in the process? As the past few days had taught all of them, nothing was beyond the realm of possibilities anymore.
At first it didn’t appear that the beast could see them. They could tell that it saw something that caught its eye, but were relatively certain that its primal brain still hadn’t sorted it all out. Its eyes were transfixed on them, though.
And then Tony was coming over the fence in a hurry. He very nearly ran into the former grocery clerk, who spun on his one good limb like a deranged music box ballerina. It lost its balance, as did Tony, and fell to the ground. The two scrambled, each in his own way, back to their feet. Neil, in the meantime, was cresting the fence and coming down in the midst of the struggle. He realized the possibility of what was unfolding before he saw the fiend.
“Fuuuuuuuck!” Neil shouted as he landed.
The thing turned and faced Neil, whose spine seized with fear instantly. Try as he might, he couldn’t lift his feet or even his arms. He was as stuck as a fly in a web, and felt just as vulnerable and helpless as well. He couldn’t swallow. He could barely draw a breath.
The creature’s smell was as intimidating as its appearance; neither of which was anything short of frightening. The putrescent dark wounds on its neck near its ear and the now shattered leg colored the air all around it with the sickening rotten smell that typically accompanied the early spring or fall; that smell of fresh death and decay stewing in the fermenting broth of the latest rain or heavy dew...only this odor was magnified a hundred times. Relentlessly churning the acid collecting therein, Neil’s stomach began to make audible sucking sounds.
The ghoul reached out for Neil, who only then realized that on its left hand were only two fingers; the others having been gnawed down to below the first knuckle. A further chill then roughly handled Neil’s immobile spine. He still couldn’t move. He could only watch. He was a spectator at his own death.
Its hands grabbed hold of Neil’s jacket and tried to pull him closer to its chomping jaws. Neil’s arms somehow broke free of their paralysis and grabbed hold of his attacker’s ragged smock in an attempt to hold him at bay. Looking like a pair of tussling hockey players, they shifted positions slightly and seconds later it was over.
Neil let go and the beast’s lifeless body fell at his feet. The thing’s head was just about gone from the ear up. Neil saw Tony, who was pointing up at Jerry on the deck. He still had the hunting rifle on his shoulder at the ready. Neil waved to him thankfully and looked back down at the purulent pile of flesh. It was hard to remember that it was at one time a man...a young man, not much more than a teen really.
With a slap to his shoulder, Tony exhorted Neil, “C’mon, goddamnit. Can’t you hear that?”
Neil shook the daze and focused. It was the sound of hundreds of footsteps on pavement and the sound was growing as its source grew nearer. Neil nodded and they both ran off, carrying the ladder haphazardly and leaning it against the fence agai
n without the same care or caution they had exercised in their coming. With adrenaline-amplified muscles, the two of them were able to negotiate the six-foot high cedar fence fairly easily, hardly even using the ladder to crest the wooden barrier. When Neil came down on the opposite side, he felt a sense of relief and wonderment overtake him. He and Tony grabbed the metal top of their climbing aid and pulled it over, letting it rattle and crash just inside their side of the fence.
Despite the fact that the back deck on which Meghan and Jerry were still standing was missing its bottom several steps, a cautionary move suggested by Jerry earlier, Tony and Neil were able to get themselves up and out of the yard without even slowing their pace. Like seasoned gymnasts, they leapt up and were on the deck in a matter of seconds.
“Are we good?” asked Jerry.
With shaking hands and a spine that was still twitching and tingling with fear and adrenaline, Neil said, “Let’s just get back inside.”
Chapter 39
Back in the living room of their newfound house-turned-bunker, Neil was finding it hard to catch his breath. He couldn’t shake the hold from his mind of the creature’s face and its cold dead eyes, the eyes of a predator...of a shark, not a man. There wasn’t a shred of humanity in him at all. He wasn’t even quite sure if it was even fitting to be referring to it as he or him.
Meghan put her hand on his shoulder and started to rub in gentle circles. When he looked up at her, though , she realized that he wasn’t even aware she was touching him.
Neil pulled away abruptly and walked over to the window. He looked through the crack in the blind down the street toward the now burning house. It seemed to be working. All of them that were in the street were starting to drift toward the fire. There were perhaps fifty of them by then. Every time he happened to look out into the street, there seemed to be more. Soon the house would be as much a prison as a sanctuary. How much longer could they hold out?
Alaskan Undead Apocalypse | Books 1 & 2 | Infection & Containment Page 15
