Beyond Dead | Book 1 | The Cough

by Frost, Christopher

  10

  EMERGENCY BROADCAST SYSTEM: THIS IS NOT A TEST… ALL RESIDENTS ARE ADVISED TO STAY IN THEIR HOMES… THIS IS NOT A TEST… FOLLOWING COUNTIES UNDER QUARANTAINE… HILLSBORO…ROCKINGHAM…CHESHIRE…SULLIVAN… MERRIMACK… THIS IS NOT A TEST… ALL RESIDENTS ARE ADVISED TO STAY IN THEIR HOMES… THIS IS NOT A TEST…

  11

  Up until two days ago Bob would have spent his early morning as a janitor at the Adult Learning Center. A job he had enjoyed for the better part of eighteen years as he went into the back forty. Now there was no job. Not for him.

  Bob sat on the rooftop of his apartment building looking down at the city streets that should have been alive like an ant hill not tumbling like a ghost town. Overhead, a military helicopter, one of those Blackhawks he thought they were called, would buzz by every once in a while. He sat in a lawn chair with a cigar in his mouth and a bottle of Grey Goose he had pillaged out of a deserted neighbor’s residence.

  Fifteen minutes ago he had been sober for more than twenty-seven years. Still took the time to go to a meeting once a week and always the early mass on Sunday morning. If he thought there was a heaven to follow after life he might have thought for a second about taking those chugs from the bottle again, but all he had to do was look down at the street toward all the dead that just wouldn’t die. He knew there was no afterlife after all. The good book had gotten that one wrong.

  So, he took another tug of the bottle and set it down on his knee where the sun reflected through the half empty glass. No longer any such thing as ‘glass half full’, it was always going to be half empty from these days out.

  Next to the foot of the lawn chair Bob sat in was an old AM/FM radio powered by good ole’ Duracell batteries. Not those fancy new ones that needed to be plugged in and charged. He figured there were a lot of people stuck in the quarantine zone with nothing but those new age iPods and cell phones, and satellite radios, all running on power and the power was out. The lights had flickered on and off for most of the night before the power cut and the city went dark. The gennies over at the hospital had kicked in and hummed out like a swarm of bees in the quiet of the city, only no one could use the hospital, it was overrun with the dead. A few police cars would weave through the deserted streets from time to time, maybe knocking out a few dead before careening off to who knew where. He hadn’t seen a fire truck, even though when the night came you could see fires brewing throughout the city like candle flames.

  Before the power had flickered its last time and the city had gone dark, Bob had frantically been trying to call his daughter in North Carolina where Virginia was a nurse. Bob too was a victim of fancy gadgets and he had forgotten to charge his cell phone. Having gotten rid of a landline a year ago to save some money, the cell had become his only phone line. It hardly ever rang. He was more of a solitary man. When it did ring it was either his boss calling him in to offer some overtime or Virginia calling to check in on her old man.

  Virginia had gotten involved with one of the resident doctors down in her new hometown after leaving New Hampshire in her rearview mirror. Bob had met the fellow on two occasions, didn’t care for the man, not because he was sleeping with his daughter – fuck that never got easy – but because the man didn’t have a firm handshake. All of this he kept to himself and gave Virginia his blessing because it was what she needed to hear. There were so many miles of distance between them he couldn’t bear to live with a rift between them as well. Especially over something so silly, and at the end of the day it was silly, but a man needed to have a firm handshake. Something his father had taught him when he was young and believed to this day. A man that shook like a ‘sally’ was no man for his daughter. Maybe she would wise up and realize that on her own or maybe not.

  Bob had called every twenty minutes or so, trying not to run out of battery life on his cell. When the battery had run out and it was warning him that he was down to five percent life, his last conversation with his daughter had been to her voicemail box. At least he was able to hear her voice one last time, even if it was a recorded version. He had wept into his hands for the better part of the evening because he knew, just knew, that he would never see his daughter again. He could only pray to the good Lord that the quarantine zone was as far as this hell would spread and the military and CDC would have an answer for it one way or another. Bob was sure, though, that he was not getting out of the zone alive. His fate would either be to walk the days away as one of the dead or, what he believed would truly happen, was the White House would drop a nuke on the lot of them and contain the pandemic by eradicating it in a ball of fire. Bob wanted to be right about option two. Option one scared him to his core. Those vile dead roaming the city was a fate worse than – well death.

  Most of his apartment building was empty. Those folks that lived around him, both the older ones as well as the younger families with kids and their loud music blaring all night, had all tried to escape the zone he suspected. Only Maddie remained. After a substantial amount of convincing, Bob moved her up to the top floor across from his one bedroom. Carla Rodriguez, a waitress at a local diner, had taken her three-year-old son and fled against Bob’s strong objections. Maddie and Bob were the final tenants of 1325 Spruce street Apartments 4A and 4B. It had taken Bob about five hours to do his best to secure the building against whatever those things were moving throughout the city and spreading faster than any flu or plague ever had. There had been a chain with a lock that belonged to a young boy’s bicycle that he used to bolt the entrance. It was the only time he spent outside the apartment building on the streets. It had been fast and efficient. The second of the two doors that opened into the apartment had a keypad that buzzed the door open. Bob had used a crowbar to break into the apartments and start dragging or hauling what furniture, refrigerators, beds, dressers, anything with any kind of substantial weight to barricade the entrance. From the second floor he pushed similar objects down the stairs making an obstacle for anything that might get through the doors. The same plan for the third and fourth floor. Maddie and he were sleeping on mattresses strewn on the floor of their bedrooms. Maddie was in her early forties, still a striking woman, and Bob hadn’t felt comfortable asking her to stay with him though it would have been for the best. Especially if they had to flee. The roof being the only place to flee and then a quick dive off the roof to end it all.

  All he could pray for was that if it came to that swan dive off the rooftop, he would not rise again as one of them, that his death, and that of Maddie’s, would be final.

  On the radio, the volume turned low enough to hear but not enough that the repeat message became obnoxious, the emergency broadcast continued to play its pre-recorded message.

  Bob leaned back in the lawn chair and closed his eyes to concentrate. He was trying to see a way out of this. Formulate a plan of escape. At the moment he had none, so he let the sun burn his white skin while he tried to forget the world for a time.

  12

  Virginia: Hi, you’ve reached Virginia Sanders. I’m not home right now or I’m running rounds. Leave a message or shoot me a text and I’ll get back to you as soon as I’m available. Thank you and have great day.

  Bob: Hey it’s Dad, give me a buzz back as soon as you get this.

  Virginia: Hi, you’ve reached Virginia Sanders. I’m not home right now or I’m running rounds. Leave a message or shoot me a text and I’ll get back to you as soon as I’m available. Thank you and have great day.

  Bob: Dad again. It’s really important you call me back.

  Virginia: Hi, you’ve reached Virginia Sanders. I’m not home right now or I’m running rounds. Leave a message or shoot me a text and I’ll get back to you as soon as I’m available. Thank you and have great day.

  Bob: Dad…again. Virginia, call me ASAP. It’s important. My phone’s gonna die and we don’t have power up here for me to charge it.

  Virginia: Hi, you’ve reached Virginia Sanders. I’m not home right now or I’m running rounds. Leave a message or s
hoot me a text and I’ll get back to you as soon as I’m available. Thank you and have great day.

  Bob: You must be busy sweetheart. By the time you get this my cell will be dead. I don’t know what the news is saying down there but I don’t want you to worry. I’ll be alright. The military and police and everyone are all over this so don’t worry that I’m inside the quarantine zone. I’m staying in my apartment like the authorities are telling everyone to do and that’s what I plan on doing.

  Bob continued: You know I have always been proud of you. From the moment you were born you were such an old soul. So strong and determined to do everything you saw your older cousins doing. You wouldn’t be excluded, and you took chances. You got that from your mom. But you got your ruggedness from your old man. Virginia, stay strong. Don’t cry for me. Don’t worry. As soon as I can, I will be in contact. It may be a day or two or it may be weeks. But I’m okay and you will be okay. (sigh) You are my only child. I think I’m glad that is the case because I’m not sure I could have loved another child the way you stole my heart that first night you were born, and your mother put you on my chest to sleep. I love you, Ginny. I guess that’s all I can say…

  13

  “It’s clear, go!”

  Sarah, holding baby Bowen, ducked under the push-rail of the locked door, her feet making a pop pop pop sound as the pieces of glass inside the door broke. Kat stood outside on the sidewalk for as long as she thought safe, listening for Sarah to stop moving somewhere in the darkness behind her. There were no dead. She stared across the lifeless parking lot. Cars that would never need drivers again sat quiet in a scatter of parking spots. Over the crest of the parking lot, the early morning sunrise was beginning to bleed across the horizon. Dark shades of reds and pinks and even hints of orange. Powdered clouds moved lazily over the colors. On this morning there was nothing beautiful about the sunrise. The sky looked mockingly down at the earth as if it was an entertained observer during the end of days.

  “Kat?”

  Kat ducked inside. She made her way over to Sarah who stood watching the darkness for any sign of movement. There was none. She didn’t believe there would be. Whatever the hell was spreading it wasn’t airborne, not as far as she could tell. They had come across other people, people that were still alive, as they had tried to make it out of the city and none of them had – well none had changed. As far as Kat could tell, those unlucky ones that came in contact with the revived dead were only infected after being bitten. She and Sarah had witnessed that. They had seen some of the other living surrounded by the hordes of dead and were mauled to death. Torn to pieces and feasted on like a fawn in the clutches of a pack of wolves. Those people that died, they never got back up again.

  All of the businesses in the strip mall that Kat had ushered Sarah and baby Bowen into were closed. Dark windows peered out toward the approaching sun. Kat had chosen a women’s gym because there was no ADT sign in the window and the gym ran twenty-four hours, unlocked by a keycard much like the ones they used at the hospital. Kat had taken a chance there was no security and smashed the door. She knew there would be supplies here. Not everything they needed, not even close now that they had baby Bowen, but enough to get through the day and maybe even the night. Sarah was already over in the small kitchen

  pulling out food and drinks. There would also be showers and maybe some changes of clothes, towels for the baby they could use as diapers for the time being. It was by no means perfect.

  “What are you doing?” Sarah asked, looking over her shoulder as she poured milk into a cup.

  “Blocking the door. What are you doing?”

  “Trying to feed the baby.”

  The baby.

  Bowen was their greatest concern. He should have been breast feeding and instead he was born into a world falling apart at the seams and hadn’t had any food in almost half a day. Not a good way to come into the world. Kat hoped that Sarah could get the milk into him but it wouldn’t be easy. There was no time for her to worry about baby Bowen. If she didn’t block the door and those things came inside they wouldn’t have to worry about feeding the baby. He would be food for them.

  “What’s that?” Kat asked. She had finished blocking the door with two desks and a few barbells to help weigh it down. In truth she didn’t think it would hold for more than thirty seconds but kept that fact to herself. Now she sat beside Sarah, who was cradling Bowen in her arms behind the counter.

  “A squeeze-bottle. I’m not sure what was in it but I dumped it and filled it with the milk. It smells citrusy but it’s the best we have.”

  “Better than nothing.”

  “Better than nothing,” Sarah agreed. “What do we do now?”

  Kat shook her head, “I don’t know.”

  “Me either.”

  Baby Bowen was sucking on the tip of the squeeze bottle while Sarah gently bounced him in her arms keeping his face close to her chest. Kat stood up and paced around. Think, think, think. They needed a plan. The strip mall had no power, like most of the city. No backup generator either. What she needed was to know what the hell was going on in the world and if someone, anyone, was coming to rescue the living. She did have power to her smartphone, however there was no connection to the internet or cell service.

  Think.

  Think.

  Think.

  “Oh, fuck,” Kat said. Her body slumped in defeat as she strode to the windows, which were tinted so outsiders couldn’t look into the women’s gym and there were large signs over them, GET FIT NOW, WOMEN’S GYM ONLY, NO MEMBERSHIP FEE, and $19.99 A MONTH. Kat peered out between the small cracks of the windows frame and the large advertising foam boards and watched the parking lot. Skulking along outside were two of the monsters. The dead. Also, there was a parking lot of cars. Maybe twenty. Could one of them still have the keys in the ignition or a spare set under the visor, in the glove box, or under the tire well in one of those magnet key holders? It was worth a try. And it was the only way she was going to be able to get any communication. A car radio.

  “What is it?” Sarah asked.

  “The cars. If I can get one started, we’ll have a way to move and we’ll have the radio. Someone’s gotta be out there broadcasting something. If even the emergency broadcast system. We can’t be the only survivors, Sarah, the odds of that are just…astronomical.”

  “Okay,” Sarah said standing up, “let’s go break into some cars.”

  “You have to stay here with the baby.”

  “It’ll be faster if we both go. I can check car doors and still carry Bowen.”

  “Yeah, but can you defend yourself if one of them come up on you?” Kat pointed and Sarah’s gaze followed her finger to one of the dead.

  “There isn’t that many.” Sarah was peeking through the cracks now, “I only see a couple. Oh! And that one over there!”

  “Maybe there’s more.”

  “They’re so slow. We can do this. We got this far from the hospital and we ran around plenty of them.”

  “And that group of teenagers? What about what we saw happen to them?”

  “Don’t think about that. They were stupid and careless. Those kids were taunting them.”

  “You’re not coming.”

  “Kat?”

  “No, Sarah. Fuck, can you just listen to me! I’m not letting you take the goddamn baby out into that parking lot with those damn things crawling all over the place.

  “I’ll get to a car and swing up to the front door. You can hop in and we are out of here. Gather as much food, bottles of water, anything you can get it into these,” Kat pulled down a gym pack from the display, sale tag still twirling the low price of $24.99, and threw it to Sarah. “Just do what I tell you. I won’t be long. One way or the other I’ll be back. Just be ready to run.” Kat didn’t tell her that by ‘get ready to run’ she didn’t just mean to the car. There was one hell of a chance that she wouldn’t find a single car with any spare key. If that was the case, she would make as much noise as possi
ble and get the dead to follow her away from Sarah and baby Bowen. At least try and give them a chance.

  Kat ran out into the parking lot.

  Sarah watched her from the darkness of the gym.

  “Hurry.”

  14

  123 Maple Street.

  Home of Paul and Marie Shore. Married couple since May 2001. Happily married had disappeared from the description of their marriage more than five years ago. Three years ago, Paul began having an affair with Cassandra Ross, and nine months ago he had accidently knocked her up. His wife didn’t know. The affair he suspected she might have a clue about but that was it. They went to marriage counseling on a weekly basis. It wasn’t so much for them as it was for their thirteen-year-old daughter Amy who they wanted to save the pain of a divorce. At least until she was eighteen and off to college.

  The affair with Cassandra Ross began at work. It started with harmless flirtation and quickly escalated to secret rendezvous at the corner café and then the back of her minivan with its well-tinted windows. She was also a married woman with a son of her own. The affair was never supposed to be anything more than casual sex. A happy break for both of them from their unhappy marriages. Cassandra’s husband was a pilot for Delta and she had no plans of leaving him or his money. When they became pregnant, she told her husband the only thing that she could, the child was his of course. He didn’t need to question her. Unlike Marie Shore, Kevin Ross had no suspicions whatsoever there was any infidelity in the marriage.