Apocalyptic Beginnings Box Set

by M. D. Massey

  He came to a four-way stop sign. Across the way was the school where Addie’s daughter was presumed to be. The building was large and surprisingly modern for the rural area. He stayed at the stop sign for a minute, scanning, contemplating his first move.

  “What do you think?” Henry asked. “Should we pull right up front?”

  “Might as well. Can’t be any worse there than anywhere else,” Nick sighed.

  “All right then.” Henry drove forward, pulling into the bus lane in the school parking lot. “Let’s use our guns sparingly.” Henry shut off the truck and got out, Nick and Thomas following.

  All of them put on packs with minimal supplies. They each put a Sig in the waistband of their pants. Henry and Nick grabbed the double-sided axes, Thomas grabbed a machete. Then Henry decided to grab a rifle just in case.

  “Sparingly,” Henry reminded them with a quirked brow. He looked around for the best entrance point into the school. “I guess the front door is just as good as the others.” Henry and Nick walked forward, then realized Thomas wasn’t following. Henry turned around. “You all right, mate?”

  Thomas stood still, then he spoke quieter than normal. “Kids. We’ll be killin’ kids my age.”

  Henry walked over to the scrawny, gaunt boy, placing a hand on his shoulder. “Thomas, you know they are no longer themselves. It’s just their body being controlled by a virus. We are helping them.”

  “I know. I killed my sister.”

  Henry put his hand on Thomas’s shoulder. “Thomas, I need you. Can you swallow it for now and move forward? When we get back into the truck, you can let it all out.” Thomas nodded. Henry rolled his neck. “Are you ready?”

  “Yeah.” Henry and Thomas joined Nick at the front entrance, looking in the window.

  “Anything?” Henry approached with little sound. Nick glanced at him. When Henry saw Nick’s frightened face, he peered into the window. “Holy shit…”

  “I think we may be outnumbered,” Nick whispered. For a small moment, he regretted coming on the mission. There were hundreds of undeads tripping over one another in the front entrance alone. “This must be why Addie didn’t want us to come.”

  “All right, new plan. Let’s find another entrance point.” Henry walked toward the left side of the building. The cafeteria. He looked through the windows. “Bloody hell.”

  Nick came up behind him. “Christ. There must be twice as many of them in here.”

  “Uh, Henry? We have company.” Thomas was just shy of rounding the corner when he saw about a dozen undeads. They sniffed the air, then staggered toward them.

  Henry ran forward, swinging the axe, Nick following close behind. One by one, the undeads’ heads were hacked off their bodies with one vicious swing after another. Thomas stabbed the machete through their heads to ensure a true death. Henry looked down at the carnage around him and shook his head. Without another thought, he wiped the axe off on the pant leg of the true dead at his feet.

  As they traveled farther around the school, they saw another door. Henry ran up to it and peered through the window. The hall seemed to be empty, but he knew better.

  “I’ll take the lead. Nick, bring up the rear.”

  “Okay.”

  Thomas stood behind Henry, who grabbed the handle. Henry took a long, deep breath, trying to calm his nerves, then pulled the door open.

  The smell of death hit him hard, almost knocking him over. Both Nick and Thomas gagged behind him. Henry closed the door in haste. He bent over, trying to rid his nasal passages of the aggressive odor.

  “Okay. That has to be the worst yet.” Nauseated, Henry shuddered as he stood straight with the back of his hand over his nose. He slipped off his pack and tucked the axe into the largest compartment, the handle sticking out. He pulled off his shirt and tore it in to strips so they could have some sort of buffer between their mouths and noses and the horrific funk that would soon permeate every pore of their body. Once his pack was on his back again, Henry put his hand on the door handle. He inhaled every ounce of fresh air he could before he pulled the door open.

  The first hallway only had a few rooms. They opened each door, hoping to find Addie’s daughter right away. Henry would call out for her in every room they entered, but not a single sound greeted him.

  When they made it to the end, he saw it would lead them either left or right. They decided left because they figured the right would lead them to the front where there were hundreds of undeads.

  They cleared room after room, hall after hall, until they reached a staircase. There were true dead bodies piled up on the stairs, almost like a barricade. To Henry, that was a sure sign that some people must be, or had been, alive.

  They clambered over the decaying corpses. After he slipped several times on the black sludge oozing around them, Nick had to stop to vomit. The true deads were piled all the way up to the third floor.

  They made it to the landing and stopped for a moment to look around. Henry tried to pull open the door, quickly realizing it was chained from the inside.

  “Shit!” he yelled, punching the door, not thinking about his broken hand. He growled in agony, shaking it at his side. His frustration was at a boiling point after climbing over piles of true deads. He put his hands on his hips and sighed. When he looked up, he saw two small windows at the top of the door. Nick glanced up.

  “Henry, let’s break those and push Thomas through. He’s the only one thin enough to fit.”

  Henry looked back over his shoulder at Thomas and shrugged. “You up for that?”

  “I guess bein’ scrawny will actually come in handy for a change.”

  Nick smashed the windows with his axe. Once he cleared it, he had Thomas climb up on his back.

  “What do you see?”

  “Nothin’. I don’ hear or see nothin’.”

  “All right. I’m going to bring you down.” Nick squatted, and Thomas got off his shoulders. They worked out a plan to get him over and shoot the locks, if necessary.

  Once Thomas got through the window and landed on the floor, Henry and Nick backed away from the door and pressed up against the side wall. Thomas shot the padlock, then opened the door. They scrambled in and wrapped whatever chain was left back around the handles, just in case.

  The floor plan looked to be a square, rooms all around the outer perimeter and again around the inside. There was another door, like the one they had just entered, at the end of the corridor. It, too, was chained and padlocked. They decided to start at the end where they were, going through every room until they circled all the way around.

  They were halfway around when they heard several soft footsteps. Henry put his finger to his lips. Nick stayed in the back as they shuffled toward the faint sounds. Henry stopped at the corner and peeked around it, catching a glimpse of a younger girl. When she saw them, she ducked back around. Henry signaled for everyone to remove the shirt scraps from their faces.

  “We’re here to help, sweetheart,” Henry said loud enough for the girl to hear, but not so loud as too attract attention.

  She peeked out from around the corner again. He got a good look at her and knew right away that she wasn’t Addie’s daughter. She was too young.

  “Listen, sweetheart, we’re here to help. We’re looking for a particular girl. Rosa MacEntyre. Do you know her, or where she is?” She continued to peek around the corner, but didn’t come any closer. “I’m going to come to you. I promise my friends and I will not hurt you.” Henry led Thomas and Nick down the hall, toward the girl.

  They could hear her breathing. Henry stopped about five feet from the corner. “It’s okay. I promise you no harm. Can we talk, please? Here…” Henry reached into his pack and pulled out a bottle of water and a protein bar. He set them on the floor and pushed them to the terrified girl.

  Her face and hands were filthy, like her clothing. She was so thin, close to being emaciated, her bloody and gore-stained clothes hung on her, much like Thomas’s. Henry pegged her to be about
seven or eight. She looked at the offering for a moment, then scurried over like a wild animal, snatching them and tearing open the bar. She ate and guzzled the water like she hadn’t had a thing to eat or drink for days.

  Henry, Nick, and Thomas watched her while she drank nearly half the bottle of water, then took several deep breaths. Henry dug into his pocket and pulled out the small picture of Addie’s daughter. He held it out to the girl. She examined it, then looked up at Henry.

  “Have you seen this girl?” he asked. She nodded once. “Is she alive? Can you take us to her?” She nodded once again. She slowly walked backward, still facing Henry, Nick, and Thomas.

  She continued down the hall until they reached what looked like a storage room. She tapped on the door in a calculated rhythm. The door creaked open, and a couple pairs of eyes peered out through the darkness.

  “Rosa MacEntyre?” Rustling. “Rosa, I know your mum, Addie. I’m here to take you home.”

  In a scratchy, weak voice, a girl replied. “How do we know you’re telling the truth?”

  “I have a picture that she gave me. She has been looking for you, but she hasn’t had the wherewithal to get into the school until my crew showed up on your doorstep yesterday. She desperately wants you home.”

  “What’s your name?”

  “Henry Daniels.” He pointed to the others. “This Nick Cooper, my fiancée’s brother, and this is Thomas Anderson. He’s a family friend.” There was a long pause. “We can help you all. Please, come out. We want to take you back to your mum, Rosa. We don’t want to hurt you in any way.”

  “I don’t know any British guys.”

  “I know you don’t know me.” Henry was flustered. “Shit,” he said under his breath, running his fingers through his hair.

  Nick watched him carefully, hoping his temper would stay in check, then pulled out bottles of water and more protein bars. He set them down at the door. The little girl snatched them up.

  “Hey,” Nick scolded in a gentle manner. “Those are for them, too. I know you’re thirsty and hungry, but so are they.”

  Reluctantly, she set them back down. A pair of hands came out from the bottom of the door and grabbed the water and bars. Wrappers crinkling and the sounds of water being guzzled filled the quiet.

  “Rosa, please, come on out,” Henry pleaded. “We haven’t harmed this little lass here.”

  The door opened an inch at a time. There were three teens crammed in the tiny storage room. One by one, they exited into the hallway. Henry smiled.

  “Thank you. Can we sit and chat?” Rosa nodded. Everyone sat on the dirty tiled floors, leaning up against a bank of metal lockers. Rosa glared at the three of them. “It’s going to be difficult getting all of us out of here. We’re parked out front.”

  “I know. We saw you pull up,” Rosa mumbled.

  “There are hundreds of undeads roaming down there. You all are pretty brilliant, I must say. Piling up the true deads on the stairs as a barricade.” The kids all smiled at Henry’s complement. “Now, if this is a high school, I’m curious to know—”

  “My mom was a teacher. I was helping her in class on that day,” the youngest girl said, picking at the holes in her worn cotton pants.

  “What’s your name, little love?” Henry’s voice dripped with sweetness. She looked up at him with worry, fear, and some relief.

  “Julianna.”

  Henry smiled at her. Then looked at the boy next to Rosa.

  “I’m Justin, and this is my sister, Shay.”

  “I’m glad to meet all of you. Obviously, the circumstances aren’t quite ideal. Quick question. Why was Julianna out by herself when the three of you were tucked away in the storage room?”

  “We cleared out this floor several weeks ago. She tends to want to be by herself, and when we heard the glass breaking in the doors, we scrambled into there. Julianna was nowhere near us. Where were you anyway?” Justin looked at Julianna, waiting for a response. She blushed.

  “I was sitting in Mrs. Hanely’s room, imagining what it would be like to be in school again.” Rosa put her arm around Julianna in a loving manner.

  Shay seemed to be much like Thomas. She stayed in the background, watching what was happening in front of her. Henry cleared his throat. All the kids looked to him.

  “All right. I say we go back the way we came in. Do you all know the school quite well?” They nodded. “If we run into trouble, I’m going to rely on you…” He looked at Justin, “to help navigate.” Everyone glanced at one another, their fear saturating the air. “What kind of weapons did you have?”

  Justin got up and went into the storage room. He came out wielding a couple baseball bats and a few metal bars that could have been chair or desk legs.

  “Aren’t they zombies? You called them undeads,” Justin said.

  “Well, yes, I guess you could call them zombies. We just—”

  Nick interrupted. “I think we should get moving.” Thomas nodded with a grunt.

  “Is there anything else you have stored up here that you want to get? We won’t be coming back.” Henry gazed at the kids, who all looked at one another.

  “We have some food and juice left. Not much at all. We’ve been limiting it to one of each per day.” Rosa went into the storage room for a few moments. They could hear her rummaging around. She struggled with a large backpack as she came out of the room.

  “Ready?” Henry asked.

  “I would like to get Julianna to her mom’s classroom.” Rosa stood strong, much like her mother, even though the backpack seemed to weigh more than she did. Justin grabbed it off her back and put it on himself.

  “Where is it?” Henry asked as he rolled his neck, rubbing it. Nick and Thomas glanced at one another.

  “The second floor,” Rosa said with fear.

  “Have you cleared that floor?” Henry asked. Rosa shook her head.

  “We just tied the door handles together. All the bodies on the stairs came from up here and on the landings.”

  Henry pulled Nick and Thomas aside. The kids watched intently while the three of them whispered back and forth. They walked back over.

  “Here’s the plan. We’re all going to go at once. I don’t want to have to backtrack, unless we absolutely have no choice. I have a few rules, though.” Justin rolled his eyes. “You may not like that but, I can assure you, I’m well-equipped for this.”

  “What are you? Some sort of comic book freak zombie fighter?” Justin’s words dripped with sarcasm.

  “You would get along well with my fiancée,” Henry added, smiling.

  “Whatever, dude. I just want to get the fuck out of here.” Everyone looked at Justin. “What?”

  “Anyway…,” Henry piped up. “We’ll be going in this order, and we do not break our order unless I instruct otherwise. Nick is second-in-command. I will be first. Rosa will follow me, then Julianna, Shay, Justin, Thomas, and Nick. Are we clear?” Justin and Rosa looked at one another and nodded.

  “Yes.” Justin passed out the weapons they had been using.

  “We’ll stick together. We mustn’t separate. Oh, and one more thing…” He grabbed his torn shirt from his pack and tore off sections for each of the kids to put around their mouth and nose. “It doesn’t help much, but it’s better than nothing.”

  They began their slow descent down the stairs to the second floor. It was exhausting climbing over the rotting, oozing corpses. They stopped once for Shay to throw up. Rosa ended up carrying Julianna so she could hide her face from the gore.

  They made it to the second floor landing. Rosa set Julianna down, but kept her face tucked into her abdomen. Henry pressed his ear up to the doors, then looked at Nick. “Thomas, hop up on my shoulders.” Henry squatted and lifted Thomas up. Henry grimaced, even though he was a lightweight. His body aches were getting worse.

  “Holy shit,” Thomas said, an edge of panic in his voice. That was all Henry needed to hear. He lowered him back down.

  “Have your guns ready.
On three, people. Be ready because they won’t hesitate.” Fear hung heavier than the smell of death in the stairwell. Henry rolled his neck again.

  “You okay?” Nick asked, touching Henry’s shoulder.

  “I’m fine!” he snapped, then realized the venom in his words frightened the kids. “Sorry. Yes, I’m fine. Thank you for asking.”

  Henry took a couple deep breaths, then pulled off the chain that held the door shut. When he placed his left hand on the handle, he gripped his Sig in his right. A sharp pain ran up his arm. Thinking he must have injured his hand further, he switched his gun to his left.

  Henry knew he had been trained to shoot with his left as well as he did with his right, but he had some doubt of his abilities. It was not the time to let a flicker of self-doubt enter his mind, though. He closed his eyes briefly, then reopened them, forcing himself into program mode. Instinctive behavior was a survivalist’s best friend, and Henry was in form.

  He counted. “One, two…” He paused momentarily, worrying that he was putting these kids in jeopardy. Stop thinking, he thought to himself, pulling himself back into program mode. “Three!” he yelled. Henry whipped open the door and forced his way in. There were several undeads staggering toward him. Julianna and Shay screamed as he shot all of them. They dropped to the floor in awkward piles of gore and grimy fabrics.

  “Stab their heads!” Thomas yelled at Shay as he handed her his machete. He shot the undeads rounding the corner. Shay, paralyzed with fear, held the machete in midair. Justin snatched it and stabbed every one of their heads. He stood over them, bat in one hand and sludge-covered machete in the other, his chest pumping with adrenaline. Henry had already moved forward.

  Nick yelled, “Henry! Three o’clock!” Henry spun and shot the two undeads. They fell into a crumpled mess. Again, Justin jammed the machete through their soft, rotting flesh. Julianna pressed her body up against Rosa, who protected her the entire time.