The ZWD Trilogy (Book 1): Zombie World Dominance [The Destruction Begins]

by L. D. King

  Zeyad Sarraf was born in Luxor. His boyhood friend, Mohab Tahan, was born there as well. They grew up together.

  Sheref Essa’s family had moved from Cairo to Luxor when he was twelve years old. Their families lived in the same neighborhood and they had shared many of the same classes in school.

  Zeyad was an imposing man. He was a big man. When he entered a room he commanded attention. He had been a star football player in school. He was the team’s striker. Zeyad could score a goal when no one else could. To everyone’s amazement, he was more than a jock. He was also on the debate team in high school. He was unique in that he had a brain as well as a fit, trim and well-muscled body.

  As the school’s leading football player, Zeyad was the team captain. At any time, he could have his choice of any girl in the school, but throughout high school he dated one girl. Her name was Sekhet Ghannam. She had been on the debate team as well.

  Mohab had played on the high school’s basketball team and fancied himself a lady’s man. He had never married. Sheref had joined the debate team as well. His team won many debate tournaments throughout Egypt. Like his friend Mohab, Sheref had never married. He always told his friends that women were too much trouble for him to be tied down to one woman his entire life.

  After they graduated, they had seen an ad looking for apprentices for the maintenance program for the Luxor School District. All three applied for the program, and as luck would have it, all three were accepted.

  The school district’s apprentice program was nine months in length and had nine or ten candidates in it at any given time. It was held once a year. The three friends started on the same day, along with six others. At the end of the program, the three of them were offered full-time jobs, which they happily accepted. The other six men either dropped out before the end of the program or did not receive a job offer.

  The three worked at various jobs throughout the school district, and over the next few years, one by one, they moved up the ladder. Eventually, all three ended up assigned to work at the El Bayadeya Educational Administration building.

  Working at the administration building was about as high as they could go in their career paths. Zeyad was the only one of the three original team of apprentices that was promoted to Building Maintenance Manager, overseeing a crew of four maintenance employees.

  Zeyad married his high school sweetheart, Sekhet Ghannam, right after graduation. Of the three of them, he was the only one that was married. Now, five years later, they had two beautiful daughters. Zeyad was a devoted family man.

  He worked hard, taking as much overtime as he could get to provide for his family. Zeyad had been offered overtime today, the first day of the holiday. For this reason alone, Zeyad was in the building with his maintenance staff. They were there to ensure that the 60-year old building equipment was working while the Head Master’s meeting was being held. If not for the overtime he had to work, he would have been celebrating the Flooding of the Nile holiday with his family.

  After the meeting had been grinding on without an end in sight, Masjh, one of the elementary school principals, asked the Head Master, “Mr. Halabi, we have been here for three hours. Is there a chance that we could have our midday meal brought in? If we had food delivered, we could eat it here and not lose any time taking a break. This way we could finish our business sooner.”

  “Masjh, thank you. That is an excellent idea. Let me call my secretary. I will ask her to order out for our meal. There is a restaurant that is not far away.” He pressed the intercom button.

  “Mrs. Tannous, would you call in an order for midday meals for everyone in the building, including our maintenance staff? And if you would, call downstairs and ask one of the maintenance staff to go and pick it up, please?”

  “Yes, Head Master, I will call it in right now. Do you want to have it brought to the meeting room, or to the break room downstairs?”

  “I believe that we will take our meal during our meeting. It should shorten the meeting if we talk while we eat.”

  Mrs. Tannous called the restaurant that they frequently ordered from. She requested their standard midday meal order for sixteen servings. Then she called the maintenance staff’s office.

  “Maintenance, this is Zeyad Sarraf. How can I help you?”

  “Mr. Sarraf, this is Mrs. Tannous from the Head Master’s office. Mr. Halabi would like you to send one of your staff to pick up sixteen midday meals for us, please. The usual restaurant has our order, and it will be ready when you get there. We have ordered meals for your staff as well. We will take our meal in our offices up here. As usual, please have the restaurant send us a bill.”

  “I will have two of my men go to pick it up, Mrs. Tannous. Thank you for thinking of my staff.” He hung up the phone. “Mohab, Mahmoud, the Headmaster has ordered a midday meal. He wants us to pick it up. Please go to the restaurant on Al-Madina Almnora Street and make the pickup. There will be sixteen total meals; five are for us. The rest go to the Head Master’s office. Have the restaurant bill the Head Master’s office.”

  “We are on our way!” said Mahmoud. “Come, Mohab, let’s go.”

  “By the way,” said Mrs. Tannous. “The building is locked because of the holiday; please remember to secure the door behind you on your way out.”

  Mohab and Mahmoud walked up the two flights of stairs to the main floor of the building and went down the hallway to the back door where the school district’s vehicles were parked. The back of the facility had a wide, covered loading dock, with the door placed in the center of the dock.

  “Mahmoud, you know the trouble with the damned lock on this door. It is difficult to unlock from the outside and they are too cheap to replace it. This is why every day one of us must be the first to arrive, before anyone else. We get to fight with the old lock to get it open, then wait for everyone else to arrive. The Head Master will not allow Zeyad to replace the lock.”

  “We’ll only be gone for a few minutes to pick up the food. It won’t hurt to leave the door unlocked for that short time.”

  “All right, Mohab,” said Mahmoud, “We can do that, but if there are any problems, it will be on your head.”

  As Mohab unlocked the door, neither of them saw the six creatures standing in the shadows outside the door. Dealing with the difficult lock, Mohab was making quite a racket getting it open. When the door finally was open, he stepped outside and came face to face with the nearest creature, standing just outside the door. As Mohab stood staring at the horrible thing, it stretched out its bony arms, grabbing him around his chest and neck, dragging him out the door to the ground. It knelt down and started to claw at Mohab’s body. His dying screams were brief. He died on the landing, looking into the ripped-open chest of the creature.

  Mahmoud had been looking back down the hall and was startled by Mohab’s screams. He turned to look to see what was wrong with his friend, and as Mahmoud stepped out the door, he stumbled over his dead friend’s foot, causing him to trip and fall onto the landing. Another of the creatures was standing next to the door and fell to its knees next to Mahmoud. He began to scream, kicking and squirming and trying to wrestle his way out from beneath the creature, but it was to no avail; he could not get out of the creature’s grip. It drew its clawed appendages across his belly, ripping it open and allowing his intestines to spill onto the landing.

  Another creature joined the creature kneeling next to Mahmoud, joining in on the kill. In just a few moments, Mahmoud lay dead next to Mohab. The contents of their bodies flowed onto the loading dock, mixing together, their blood dripping onto the dirt below the landing.

  In less than sixty seconds, both men were dead from their wounds. The back door was held open by their bodies. The six horribly deformed, mutated creatures slowly shuffled into the building. To look at them, they were hunting for more people, looking for anyone to attack. They were stumbling and shuffling their way down the hallway toward the lobby of the building.

  At the stairs, the creatures were
drawn to the muffled sounds coming from the meeting taking place upstairs. They turned, instinctually climbing the stairs as fast as their broken bodies could go towards the sounds, shuffling, staggering, dragging themselves up the stairs, hunting for what was making the sounds.

  Slowly the creatures climbed each set of stairs, one floor at a time. The meeting was on the fourth floor. The stairs between the floors had a landing that turned the stairs to continue. The creatures made it to the second-floor, and continued their climb.

  The outer office door to the Head Master’s office suite stood open to the fourth floor hallway. Mrs. Tannous’ desk was closest to the open door. She could hear the strange sounds coming from the creatures climbing the stairs. The scraping, dragging sounds, combined with the low guttural moaning sounds the creatures made, were just loud enough for her to hear it from her desk.

  She asked her assistant, Mrs. Botros, “Mrs. Botros, do you hear anything out in the hallway? I think there might be someone on the stairs. I don’t think the maintenance crew would be back with the food quite yet, but if so, they might need some help. Would you mind going to see if they do?”

  “No, I do not hear anything, but I’ll go check.”

  “It might not be anything. You know this old building makes some odd noises at times.”

  Mrs. Botros left her desk, stepping out into the hall. Now she could hear the noise better. It was coming from the stairwell. It sounded like something was being scraped or dragged on the stairs. She walked to the stairs to see what was making all the racket. From the top of the stairs, she couldn’t see what was making the noise. She started to walk downstairs to find the source of the sounds. On the first landing, she got a faint whiff of the smell. As she walked further down to the third floor, she stopped. The noise had gotten much louder. Now the smell had gotten worse as well. It smelled like an open sewer or rotting meat. She continued down the stairs from the third floor to the landing. Mrs. Botros stopped, leaning over the railing.

  She could see the first two creatures coming up from the second floor. She jumped back, screaming as she ran back up the stairs as fast as she could to the Head Master’s office. She ran screaming into the office, slamming the door shut behind her, locking it.

  “Nada, I don’t know what is out there! They are coming up the stairs towards us. They look like some sort of horrible beast or something! There is more than one! Help me move a desk to block the door! From here you can’t smell it, but those damn things smell like something that has been dead for a long while! We need to let the Head Master know what is going on! He will know what to do!”

  “Mrs. Botros, calm down. What did you see? Stop screaming. The Head Master will have a fit if we interrupt his meeting.”

  “There’s some sort of horrible creatures down there coming for us. They’re on the stairs. I couldn’t see how many there were, but there were a lot, all coming up here. I am not going back out there. We need to keep the door locked. We need to block it so they cannot get in. We need to find a way out of the building. We can’t use the stairs; those creatures are on it, but the stairs are the only way down, and the creatures are coming up the stairs.”

  Mr. Halabi heard the commotion in the outer office, and left his meeting to talk to both women. He was not happy. He wanted answers and he wanted them now.

  “Mrs. Tannous, what the hell is going on out here? Both of you are disturbing our meeting. Please tell me it is something important, or I might just fire you both.”

  “Mr. Halabi, I heard a noise outside of our office. I sent Mrs. Botros to go see what was making all the noise. She came back screaming, saying that there are some kind of creatures coming up the stairs.”

  “Mr. Halabi, they look horrible. They smell like something dead. We need to get out of this office. We need to block the door.”

  “Mrs. Botros, what is wrong with you? Slow down, take your time, and tell me what you are talking about.”

  “The creatures — or whatever they are — are coming up the stairs. They smell something rotting, or like death. They have claws. Their bodies are all mutated and torn, and their flesh is hanging off their bodies in chunks… they smell putrid! Their clothes are ripped, and just… hanging on their bodies. They are coming. They are on the stairs. They are coming for us. We need to barricade the door. We need to get out of this building as fast as we can. We need to do something.”

  With all of the shouting going on, other meeting attendees started to file into the outer office. They were listening to what she was trying to say. The remainder of the meeting participants that could not squeeze into the outer office were crowding near, trying to hear what the shouting was about. Mr. Baz was one of the first people from the meeting to enter the outer office, Mr. Halabi spoke to him.

  “Mr. Baz, will you please go into the hall and see what Mrs. Botros is carrying on about? She seems to think that there are some sort of monsters out there coming after us. She said that they are on the stairs. Please go find out what this woman is carrying on about.”

  “Yes, sir, I will. Please excuse me, Mrs. Botros, I need to open the door.”

  “Mrs. Tannous,” said Mr. Halabi, “While Mr. Baz is looking for the bogeyman on the stairs, will you find out where our food is?”

  “Yes, sir, I’ll call maintenance to find out,” said Mrs. Tannous. “It should have been here by now. The restaurant is only five blocks away, and they were starting to box up our food as I was ordering it.”

  By this time, the creatures had made it to the fourth floor. They were slowly staggering, their broken, damaged bodies shuffling down the hallway, gathering in front of the closed door of the Head Master’s office.

  Mr. Baz opened the door, and tried to step into the hallway. He found himself facing the first creature standing in front of the door. Their faces were inches apart. He was shocked at what he saw, standing frozen in place, his eyes wide.

  Karim was in shock. He tried to scream, but nothing would come out. His hand was still on the office door handle. Frozen in place, he could not move. The creature swung out with its ridged, clawed hand, slashing Karim’s body across from his shoulder to his hip, flaying him open as it dragged him out into the hallway, face down on the floor.

  A second creature knelt on the other side of Karim. With their four rugged, stiff-clawed hands, they began ripping Karim’s back open, exposing his shoulder blades, ribs and the back of his belly. On the floor, he was able to find his voice. All he could do was scream about his wounds. His screams were the last sound that he would ever make. With two creatures busy killing Karim, the remaining creatures climbed over them on the floor, stumbling into the Head Master’s outer office.

  Inside, they attacked anyone they could grab in the Head Master’s office. The office was an old design, and the only way out was through the door in the outer office. Right now the creatures had the door blocked with a growing pile of the dead bodies of the secretaries and the members of this meeting.

  The floor of the office was slick with blood. Everyone inside the Head Master’s office was fleeing into the meeting room. On this day, no one in the Head Master’s office would survive. The creatures went from one victim to another until no one remained alive in the Head master’s office. Once everyone was dead, the creatures crawled over the stacks of dead, bloodied bodies and started hunting again.

  There were three of the maintenance crew left in the office in the lower basement. These were Assem, Sheref, and their boss, Zeyad. From their office in the lower basement, they could hear the screams coming from the slaughter upstairs in the Head Master’s office. The three began going up the stairs to investigate. The screams of the dying echoed throughout the building. They cautiously continued up the stairs, not knowing what was ahead. When they reached the first floor, they stopped to look around. At the end of the hallway, they could see the rear door standing open.

  “Oh, no! Look, there is Mohab’s body,” said Zeyad. “He isn’t moving. He might be dead. He never got out of the b
uilding. I can’t see Mahmoud, but I would guess that he is out there as well and is more than likely dead.

  “Come on,” he continued, “The screams are coming from upstairs. We need to be careful; if there is anything that is not right, be ready to run. I don’t want anyone else hurt. Be ready to run if you have to.”

  Cautiously, they started up the stairs to the landing below the first floor. Zeyad was in the lead, and Assem following, with Sheref in the rear. From the first floor up to the second, there was nothing out of place. They continued to climb the stairs to the third floor. They still found nothing wrong. As they started up from the third floor towards the fourth, the screams were deafening.

  There was now no doubt that they were human screams. Zeyad had spent time in the Egyptian army. He had witnessed firsthand how people died. Only the dying screamed like this. when they were nearly to the fourth floor, Zeyad stopped. Lying on the stairs, he cautiously looked along the floor. What he saw looked like it was something from a horror movie.

  Zeyad turned back to his men and whispered, “I see Principal Baz. His body is ripped open just as Mohab’s was. There is a huge puddle of blood getting larger on the hall floor. We need to get out of here, now. From what I see everyone in the Head Master’s office is either dead or dying. There is nothing that we can do for anyone in there. We need to go, now.”

  They went back down the stairs as quickly as they could. Reaching the first floor, they ran to the rear door. They were brought to a stop by the sight of their two friends’ dead bodies. As carefully as they could, they stepped over them, running to the cars in the dirt parking lot. They ran to Zeyad’s car. He was the only one of the three who owned a vehicle. They all piled into his car. Zeyad pulled out of the parking lot, squealing his tires as they roared down the street.