My heart literally stopped. No way! She didn’t know me. Unless saying ‘hi’ in the halls as we passed each other, qualified as knowing each other. Then again, she really didn’t know who I was. After all, I was only a poor kid from the wrong side of the tracks, trying to fit in with all the cool kids at school. Basically, a nobody. “You do?”
“Of course. You’re like one of the best artists in this school. I love how you draw.” She twirled a lock of curls around her fingers. Her nails sparkled, with each turn.
“Nah, I’m not that good. I mean… I guess I do okay.” What the hell? I couldn’t think for shit. All the words jumbled up inside of my head. Something about this girl made me lose it. I looked down and saw my hands shaking, so I shoved them under the desk and held onto my knees. If she saw them trembling, she’d think I was a coward.
“I think you do better than okay. You’re paintings have won tons of awards and I hear the teachers say really good things about you.” She batted her eyes at me, showing off the vivid colors of eye shadow that streaked across her lids. It hypnotized me and I pictured painting this beautiful girl somewhere in the Falls, the historic water gardens in downtown, Lake Vine, Texas.
I had to blink a few times to get my concentration back. “You do?” This girl had to be smoking something. The teachers hated me. They didn’t like where I came from or the fact that they had to let me in their ‘prestigious technical school’. If they had it their way, I would be somewhere else.
“Yes. In fact I think you’re going to be a famous artist one day. There’s a special place for you within one of the regions, if not all of them.”
I busted out laughing at what she said. “What? Nah, I don’t think so.” She might have been right, but things weren’t the same since the World Wide Depression and the Great Regions of Freedom had formed. The GRF practically ran your life. Luckily, the citizens still had a choice in what they would do with their lives, if you call choosing one of the top three choices from the career assessments they made everyone take. Test, test, test. That’s all these administrators in this God forsaken GRF did!
“What about you? I’ve seen your work displayed and it’s good, too.”
She tilted her head down, allowing the waves of curls to cover half her face. Did I embarrass her? “Please. I draw clothes and you draw people and buildings. There’s a difference.”
She did have a point, but I wasn’t about to tell her that. I wanted to make her feel good about her drawings, make her feel special, like no one else could. We were only sophomores at the time, but it would be the start of a journey that I couldn’t imagine taking with anyone else.
Those great memories vanished the moment I felt a sudden coldness creep up over my body. The people in the background continued talking and I struggled to focus in on their words. Was I about to die? Maybe I didn’t want to know so that’s why I blocked them out. Time. I needed more time to remember all the great moments I had with Kait.
A bright light shined in my left eye. It vanished as blackness fell over it. Then the same bright light blared into my right eye before turning pitch black again. I knew they were checking me out. I felt them standing right over me. The warmth of their breath, telling me they were alive and human. Unlike the air that seemed to disappear from my lungs at times.
“His pupils are dilated. Tests show he has some brain activity, but not much. We can either wait and see what happens or go ahead and inject him.” A deep and rough voice said, tunneling through my ears as it reverberated through my mind. End my life? A life that I hadn’t even had the chance to live. Would my child suffer the same fate as me?
“I’ll inform Dr. Richardson and wait for his orders.” A lady spoke softly before fading off into the cold, dark room.
Why was it so dark? Why was I so cold? My body shivered on the inside, to the point of nearly convulsing, even though it didn’t move on the outside. My blood crawled through my veins, but crumbled before circulating again. Was my body breaking apart? Was I deteriorating to nothing? I knew it wouldn’t be long now.
How did this happen? And why did this have to happen to me? That’s what started to go through my mind as I lay there waiting, my fate based on the decision of one man. The man who I knew would hate me from day one. The man my mother warned me about. Dr. Stephen Richardson, Kait’s dad. I knew it from the minute I met him that he would either take my life or destroy me somehow.
How did I know that? I’m usually right on when it comes to judging a person’s character. That’s what probably helped me stay out of trouble, even though I grew up around nothing but troublemakers. But I refused to be like my father. A no good, lying, cheating, worthless, s.o.b who left my mom with three small kids and ended up in prison. The last time I saw the man, I happened to be riding my bike outside when he drove past our house with some woman, younger than my mom, sitting next to him. Only ten years old at the time, I didn’t say anything to my mamma about it, but that memory stuck in my head.
That’s what Kait and I had in common. Dads we couldn’t stand. Dr. Richardson was the exact opposite of my dad. Where my dad abandoned us, Kait’s dad ruled her life. Maybe because he feared losing her like he had lost her mother. Unlike my loser father, Kait’s ole’ man was highly educated, smart, good-looking and worked for the dignitaries of the GRF. In his role as Director of Health Care, he had a lot of power. Primarily, he ensured all males between the ages of thirteen and forty got their monthly dose of Letumdotrophin.
I wanted to burn the tattoo off of my arm; the marking the medicine patch left on me and every guy that was forced to take it. The medicine that didn’t work and allowed Kait to get pregnant anyways. I can still see the look on her face when she told me.
“What is it, Kait? What’s wrong?” I stood in the doorway of her dormitory. Her face had turned three shades lighter. The sun-kissed California glow all gone.
“I… I need to tell you something.” Her voice trembled as she started pacing the small room.
“Ookkaay.” I shut the door behind me and rushed over to her, taking her in my arms. Her body trembled as though coming down with the flu. Never had I seen her so shook up, except when her dad said she couldn’t go to school in California. But that time, she was mad more than anything. This time, she was scared.
“I… I don’t know how to tell you this.” She broke out in a hard cry, sobbing and mumbling words that I couldn’t understand.
“Kait… what is it, baby? You can tell me.” I stroked the back of her head, holding her close to my chest. My heart pounded inside of me, fearful of what she might tell me. “It’s okay. You can tell me.” I tried to get her to calm down, to stop crying, but she was so upset.
“I’m… oh no. How did this happen?” She managed to get out between deep sighs and cries.
“How did what happen? Kait… tell me. What is it?” I took a seat on the edge of her bed, pulling her into my lap. She held on to me, like I was the only thing she had left to hang on to. Then again, I was. Her mother gone and her father back in Texas.
She opened her hand and handed me a small oval stick. It shook in her hand, like it had a mind of its own. I took the stick from her and looked at it. “What’s this?”
Her tears stopped instantly and she looked at me like I was an idiot. But who could blame her? I grew up around boys and when it came to girly stuff, I usually learned it from Kait, not my mamma. “You don’t know what this is?”
“Am I supposed to?” I said looking at the strange cross on the front of it. In our time, in our world, commercials about family planning didn’t exist. They were replaced with either abstinence or prevention. Thanks to the depression, the GRF dictated who and how many children families could have. The higher your status, the more children they allowed you to have. Basically if you were poor, that meant that you couldn’t have any kids. Unless you proved that you could care for yourself and not be a burden to society.
The GRF did everything and anything to keep us from slipping back into ano
ther deep depression. They made it their number one goal to make sure we moved forward as a society. Reminding us constantly on issues we didn’t agree on, that it was for ‘the greater good’. For the last seven years they took a dictatorial approach on controlling the birth rate. Even though it seemed to help with fewer people on government assistance and the economy rebounding, people didn’t like being told when or if they could have children.
Her eyes softened into an ‘I’m sorry’ look before she said, “It’s a pregnancy test.”
Everything stopped. The room, Kait, time, not to mention my breath. “Josh… Josh? Are you okay?” She had to shake me a few times before I came to.
“Ummm… yeah. I mean… no. No! I’m not okay and neither are you. We are not okay. Shit! How did this happen?” I squeezed the stick tightly in my hand as if that would somehow make the unplanned pregnancy go away.
“I don’t know! Isn’t that stupid medicine supposed to work?” Kait pulled up my shirt sleeve, checking my arm for the medicine patch.
I looked down at the shield surrounded by what looked like broken wings. The longer I stared at it, the more I noticed the skulls on each side of the design, indicating that all life stopped with this medicine. But for some unknown reason, it didn’t with us.
I yanked my arm away, pissed that it didn’t work. It wasn’t her fault, but it made me mad thinking about the decision we were going to have to make. “Why don’t you ask your dad!” I snapped, shoving her off my lap and standing to my feet.
I paced the floor, my arms crossed against my chest and my hands balled up in a fist. I needed to hit something, not Kait, of course, but I had to take my frustration out on something. But there was nothing I could hit, so I yelled.
“UGGGGHHHH!” I yelled, like a mad man. Not caring if I scared all the girls in the rooms next to Kait’s or if security came running down the hall. I collapsed next to her on her small twin bed. All life sucked out of me.
She looked at me, her lip quivering with fear. “I’m so sorry.”
Tears poured from her baby blue eyes and I felt bad for throwing her a low one about her dad, but it slipped out. Damn! “Come here, baby.” I pulled her back into my arms.
“What are we going to do?” Her eyes pleaded for the right answer, which I didn’t have.
All I knew was that this road wouldn’t be easy, whatever we decided to do. “Don’t worry. We will figure this all out.”
In the background, I heard the beeping from one of the monitors pick up. It started beeping faster and faster as my heart rate stayed a beat ahead of it. My blood began to move quicker, picking up the pace as it flowed toward my heart, ready to be energized again. My tongue salivated and I smelled the sweet scent of skin, the flesh of the nurse in the room and the smell of another person, a guy nearby. I knew this feeling all too well. Shit! Not again!
The weirdest thing about breaking out into one of my flesh-eating episodes was that I really didn’t remember much. Other than wanting, craving and desiring flesh like it was milk and cookies fresh out of the oven. You know the ones that are all gooey and dripping with hot chocolate. Mmmmm… yeah those kind. That’s what flesh tasted like as it rolled across my tongue, sweeping across every taste bud before easing down my throat and into my stomach. Sweet. Tasty. Savory to the very last muscle fiber.
I had never really eaten a person, or at least I didn’t think I had. I had only taken a few bites out of an arm or leg, or whatever I could rip off of them. Just enough to satisfy the craving and desires that filled my mouth. The cravings were more than a pregnant woman begging for a burger and fries from the fast food joint down the street. No, these cravings were beyond controllable. Deadly. Which meant I would stop at nothing to satisfy them.
It still freaked me out, thinking back to the first time it happened. Kait and I were going down an elevator, alone, after classes had finished. I hadn’t been feeling good all day. She teased me, saying that I had sympathy symptoms. I kind of believed her because I had been eating like crazy and kept feeling sick to my stomach off and on. I also craved meat to no end. Even to the point that I had went to the store the day before and bought a whole chicken and ripped it open the minute I got to my dorm room and ate it raw. Yep, skin, gizzards and all.
“Josh? Are you okay?” Kait said, bracing me against the wall of the elevator.
“I don’t know. I’m not feeling too good.” Saliva ran out the sides of my mouth. Kait’s skin smelled wonderfully sweet. Sweet like honey with strawberries and chocolate on the side. I wanted to lick her, like the way a dog greets his master. Fill my tongue with every bit of her innocent taste.
“You’re sweating like crazy.” She held her hand up to my forehead, checking my temperature.
I hid the truth of what was going through my mind. No way! I couldn’t tell her about the twisted cravings I had been having because I knew they would freak her out. Instead I said, “I’m so hungry.”
“Your eyes! They’re turning dark. Josh what’s wrong with you?” A look of worry washed across Kait’s face and I knew something was definitely wrong with me.
“I… I…” I wanted to say ‘I didn’t know’ but for some reason, I couldn’t speak. I had actually forgotten how to talk. How to say anything at all. All the words faded from my memory. I hung onto the railing in the elevator, watching the shiny steel walls around me narrow, closing in on me and fast.
“Josh! Oh my God! Your tongue… it’s black. Put it back in your mouth!” She let go of me and took a few steps back. The fear that formed in her eyes made me feel like a demon of some sort. Like a vampire, wanting to suck the blood out of her. Only I wanted to rip the flesh off of her. Taste the rubbery meat filled with strings of veins. Most of all, I longed to gnaw on her tender bones and crunch my teeth against the crispy pieces of cartilage. The beast in me was coming out.
Thank God, something stopped me from doing that. Maybe it was the love that I had for her which was woven deep in to my heart, telling me not to do it. Or the fact that I wanted to protect her. Shield her from everything. Shelter her against her biggest enemy, me. Yet there was no escaping what I had become.
The lights faded out and my senses honed in on one thing and one thing only. Flesh. “Run! Run!” I managed to yell the moment the doors to the elevator opened.
“Help! Somebody help me!” Kait stumbled out of the small confined space, pushing the button to close the door behind her frantically. I guess Kait had an angel on her side, because I heard a voice, ordering me to push the button to close the doors from inside. That was the last thing I remembered. My finger pressed hard against the bubbled button, keeping me locked in the six by six holding cell that didn’t allow me to tear the flesh off of anyone, at least that day.
I felt another surge of warmth, this time shoot up my arm. What was happening now? Why hadn’t I turned into the flesh-eating freak that I was destined to be? Something had changed. What? I didn’t know. I knew I didn’t want to be this man-eating zombie any more. I loved Kait and we were going to have a baby. We had a life ahead of us. I needed her. She needed me. Our baby needed us. No way could I be without her. Living or dead.
“Quick, give me 30 cc’s of methylphenidate.” A guy’s voice said. This was a different guy’s voice than the other one that had been in the room. Not only did he sound different, but he smelled different too. All of a sudden, my senses began to fade and I didn’t smell flesh any longer. Instead, the queasy smell of plastic bandages and bleach filled the room. Hospital smell. Yuk!
“Josh? Sweetie, can you hear me?”
“Kaaiitt?” I struggled to open my eyes. I had to see her. Kait was here!
“Josh, it’s me Kait. Wake up.” She gave my face a light slap.
Oh no, what was she doing here? I’m too dangerous. Then again, I was happy to see her once again before they killed me. See her mesmerizing blue eyes, feel the softness of her skin, kiss her luscious peachy lips. Place my hand on her baby bump. Kait. My beautiful, Kait.
�
��Wake up, Josh. We gotta go!”
To be continued in
Flesh Seekers
Apocalyptic Trilogy, Book 1
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Jacqueline Druga
ZOMBIE BATTLE:
Part One
OUTBREAK
CHAPTER ONE
May 2nd
Carancus, Puno, Peru
It streaked across the heavens. Green and bright, as if God Himself used a fluorescent marker and created a colorful slash mark against the star sparkled clear night sky. It didn’t make a sound, not at first.
Carlos Linderas was a simple man. He lived a modest life with only the focus of raising his young son. But on that night he focused on something else. Whatever it was that fell from the sky. He saw it. He was sitting by the window of his two room home, sewing, when he caught glimpse. He wasn’t quite sure what it was, a shooting star, meteor, anything, but he was certain it landed with an impact. First the thunderous sound, then the vibration. It rocked his stance and then his inner being when he heard the rain of debris against his tin roof.
His six year old son, Juan sat on the floor and looked up.
Carlos bolted to the door. “Stay put,” he said with a point.
“But Papa…” Juan stood.
“Stay. I’ll be back.”
Even though it was only he and his son, Carlos didn’t think much about leaving his small child alone. Not in their village, everyone watched out for everyone.
Apparently, everyone also watched the thing fall from the sky. Carlos and a few dozen others hurried to the landing site.
They had no clue how far away it was, it had to be close.
Some left on foot, others by truck. Not many drove there, not many owned vehicles.
A man named Ben led the way and a pack of others on foot. Ben was strong, fit and fast. He also owned one of the vehicles, so it was no surprise he was first to leave.
Darlings of Decay Page 11