Bugs

by Arrvada .

  “You knew them, didn’t you?”

  “Yeah.” Her movements were sharp, agitated. “I knew them all.”

  He stood, carefully, sliding his pants all the way up and fastened them. The movements cost him, but he couldn’t afford to lie still. He had to remedy what his actions had done. “I’m sorry.”

  She shook her head, shrugging dismissively. She circled the room as he picked up his shirt, one she had bought for him the night before with his money. She may have spent the better part of the night keeping him alive, but she was a creature of habit. And picking pockets was a hard habit to break. She held the shirt for him as he eased his arm and injured shoulder into the sleeve. Then quietly, gently, patiently, buttoned it for him.

  His hand lifted, cupped her chin until their eyes met. “I’m sorry I got you into this.”

  She studied his face as he studied hers. “I know.”

  He leaned toward and she braced for the kiss, then blinked in surprise when his lips brushed over her forehead. “Even still, thanks.”

  She pulled away, somehow unnerved by his gentleness. Just her luck to run into a nice guy. A nice guy who had just happened to unleash hell on her home town. “We should go.”

  “Alright.”

  Chapter Four

  Inside the cab of her truck Cam scanned the deserted parking lot and the neon sign that erratically flashed “Vacancy”. “I have to stop them. I can’t ask you to help me. You’ve done enough.”

  The engine roared to life and she shifted into reverse. “Yeah, I have. But I’m still coming with you.”

  “Why? Why are you helping me?”

  She flipped the truck around, grinding the gears and bouncing over a curb as she shifted into first. She looked over at him, her foot on the clutch. “I honestly don’t know. Now, where’re we headed, Doc?”

  “My lab.”

  ***

  He didn’t suppose infiltrating an enemy camp was ever easy, but when that enemy was a pack of mindless zombies who seemed driven to kill, it presented even more problems. They sat in the truck watching the front of the lab as the engine idled roughly, making the cab shudder around them. The sun had climbed above them and now lay hidden behind a bank of clouds. Behind them the cornfields rustled beneath the fingers of an oncoming storm and before them stood the institute that had given birth to the monsters that milled before it.

  “Here I thought all they did here was make bio-diesel.” Cheyenne drawled, slanting a look that made him want to squirm in his seat. “Well, we can’t just stroll in there.”

  She tipped down her sunglasses as she continued to study him.

  “No, but we have to get in there.”

  “You need to get in there. I don’t.”

  “I thought you were with me on this?”

  “I am.” She turned off the engine and the throaty roar died. “But I’m not the one who needs to get to my lab.”

  He frowned as she shoved open the driver’s side door. “What are you doing?”

  She tossed him the keys. “When they follow me you get your ass in there and stop them.”

  “Cheyenne!” But she was already running for the pack in front of the building.

  “Damn it!” Cam shoved open his door and levered himself out, a sharp breath whistling over the sudden pain in his shoulder.

  They spotted her or scented her, he couldn’t tell which, only that they suddenly knew she was there and as one body they turned on her. She skimmed over the black top of the parking lot on long legs, coming just close enough to have them running toward her before she veered to the right and leaped into the shelter of the corn fields. Within moments they had followed her and Cam stood alone in the parking lot.

  Hating that he couldn’t stop her, hating that he couldn’t help it, he sprinted for the building, praying for her, praying for himself.

  He ran into the familiar lobby, trying not to focus on the chaos around him, trying to ignore the dark stains on the walls and floors or the sickening stench of blood that assailed his nostrils. He couldn’t let his fear sway him, couldn’t let it take over. He pushed through the door to the stairs, remembering his frantic escape only hours before and couldn’t help but think he was a fool to be there.

  He started down the stairs, his steps slowing as a wave of fatigue and dizziness washed over him. He paused, leaned back against the wall as he tried to catch his breath, disgusted with his fear and weakness. His shoulder throbbed, burned in spite of the aspirin he had taken only a little while before. At that moment all he wanted was a nice bed somewhere and a morphine drip.

  Reluctantly he shoved himself away from the wall and continued on. All he had to do was make it to his lab, somehow amplify the EMP emitter that was in the NANOs original case. In theory he could do it, he had everything he needed in his lab. All he had to do was get there. Only one more flight of stairs. His vision wavered and he stopped again as his knees went suddenly weak. Getting shot was turning out to be a real bitch. He leaned heavy on the railing, pressing his left hand against the pain. Just a minute, he just needed one minute. He heard a door slam overhead and panic sent a cold wave rushing over his skin. He turned and ran down the rest of the stairs and through the door to his lab.

  He pushed through the door and stepped into hell.

  Bullet holes were pock marks in the walls; blood a rusty, red haze over everything. Glass lay shattered on the floor, his equipment tossed about carelessly. The lights over head flickered intermittently, a bullet having pierced through one of the long fluorescent tubes. There were no bodies and that was more horrifying to him than if there had been. He picked his way quickly across the room knowing they were coming. The holding tank had been ruptured during the first attack, yet after a cursory inspection he believed the EMP emitter would still work. All he had to do was reprogram it to transmit through the labs satellite dish. He moved through the door into the small room in which Sharpe had died and retrieved his laptop from his desk. Carrying it he turned to go back when he heard the door slam open and running footsteps enter. Everything inside of him went cold even as a hot wave rushed over his skin. He looked around quickly for anything he could use to defend himself.

  “Doc!”

  Relief was instantaneous and almost staggering. He released a breath he hadn’t known he had held and hurried out to meet her. She was ok. It was his first thought and the relief pushed aside all remaining fear. She slammed the lab door closed, cussed when she found no lock and saw how it hung loosely on its hinges.

  She looked over at him as he approached. “They’re right behind me. Tell me you got that thing to work.”

  His voice and eyes were grim. “Not yet.”

  “Get on it, Doc. We’re running out of time here.”

  He cleared a work station with a quick sweep of his arm and then set about connecting his laptop to the computer that controlled the emitter. Behind him he could hear her moving, pulling and muscling half a million dollar lab equipment into place to act as a barricade against the things he had created.

  He finished connecting the cables then powered up his computer. His heartbeat was fast, heavy and hard, the computer unbearably slow. His fingers skimmed over the keys, quick, deft, routing power, programs, frequencies into a symphony that would destroy what he had made. His vision blurred, he was so very tired. He shook his head, shook away the fatigue and the weakness of pain. Behind him Cheyenne moved the last of the equipment into place and then stood braced against the door, waiting.

  They came in a sudden avalanche, slamming their bodies into the door. The metal bent, strained, pressed tight between their mangled bodies and the barricade Cheyenne had created. She pushed back, feeling her feet slide, inch by gruesome inch, backwards.

  “Doc, you gotta hurry!”

  “Almost done. Almost, almost. Come on, come on, come on.” It became a chant for him as his fingers flew and his tired mind struggled with the calcula
tions and to find the right codes. Just a few more minutes, just a few more…

  The door cracked open, barely an inch, but it was enough for bloodied fingers to squeeze through and get a grip.

  “Doc!”

  “Another five minutes!” The frequency was right, it would kill them all, fry their circuits…

  “We don’t have five minutes!” Cheyenne braced her boots against the ground, struggling to keep the door from opening. But it did, inch by gruesome inch.

  “Almost there.” The dish was aligning now, just a few more minutes…

  Something touched his hand. Something cold, small. His eyes dropped from the computer screen, narrowed, focused. A glint of silver on the back of his hand. It moved and panic ran through him. His other hand flashed up and over, but it was too late. The NANO moved with shocking speed. He felt it touch his chin, his cheek and then it was up his nose and like a hot brand, rushing for his brain.

  “Fuck! Fuck!”

  Cheyenne looked back at him and her heart froze at the sight of blood streaming from his nose, splashing over his lips and down his chin. “Doc!”

  Blood was coming from his ears now, the pain was excruciating, fire in the brain and he dropped to his knees.

  “Doc!” She called again, but it was too late, he was already falling forward. She held against the door as they continued to pound and throw themselves against it. Her eyes looked from him to the widening crack and then to his computer screen. In the center of the screen bright white words asked the question, “Execute?”

  “Doc.” It was a prayer, a sigh, a plea.

  If he heard she couldn’t tell, he was already slipping away from her. She hesitated only a moment longer before she turned and made a dash for the computer. Behind her the door burst wide. She could hear the rush of them behind her, could hear the crash as they threw aside her barricade.

  Only ten feet, that’s all she had to cover. Ten feet... She sprinted, her feet slipping on ground slick with glass and blood. Her hand reached out, hovering just over the return key, another second… She was jerked back, ripped back by a hand twisting savagely in her hair. They hauled her away, her scream sharp, high, ripping out of her, carrying her fear and frustration with it.

  It was her scream that ripped through his pain. Ripped past the panic and the fear, past everything the B.U.G.S. in his brain was trying to do. His eyes flashed open, focused past the pain to see Cheyenne hauled kicking and screaming away from him. He pushed past the pain, the searing, blinding pain in his head as the B.U.G.S. burrowed its way through his nasal cavity and into his frontal lobe. He came to his knees, fighting past the darkness that was closing in on his conciousness. Cheyenne screamed behind him, hands closed on him and he hit enter.

  There was a loud shriek, a roar around him as darkness tunneled his vision and he dropped to the floor with the rest of them.

  ***

  “Doc. Hey, Doc, can you hear me?” The words seemed to come to him from a great distance. His eyes didn’t seem to want to respond, his lids stayed shut even when he willed them to open. “Doc?”

  His voice felt like gravel in his mouth. “I have a name.”

  Cheyenne allowed herself to close her eyes in a quick prayer of thanks. But her tone was light when she answered him. “I know.”

  He shifted, willing his body to react to the commands of his mind.

  “Easy, Doc.” That voice again, that cool velvet voice that matched bright copper gold eyes. A hand, cool and comforting touched his skin.

  His eyes finally obeyed, opening slowly and he looked up into tawny eyes.

  “Hi, Doc. Glad to see you decided to wake up.”

  “What…what happened?”

  She smiled. “You fried the fuckers.”

  “They’re gone? Dead?” He tried to sit up, but she held him back and he lacked the strength or desire to fight her.

  “Yeah, they’re all gone.”

  He looked around and even without his glasses he could tell they were no longer in his lab. “Where are we?”

  She smiled. “I finally decided to take you to the hospital.”

  “I thought you were scared to be seen?”

  “I just fought a herd of zombies; I don’t think anything will ever scare me again.”

  “Wish I could say the same.”

  “Oh yeah? What do you have to be scared of?”

  “Bugs.”

  About the Author:

  “This is how the End of the World shall be written: On Parchments of Flesh, with Pens dipped in Blood.”

  Arrvada is a writer of paranormal & fantasy work in Northern California. Her passion for writing has been further inspired by her path as a Pagan and by her studies towards a Masters in Mythological Studies.

  She completed her first full length novel at fifteen and her first publication came at 19 years old with Legend of Cauterhaugh through AmErica House Publishers. Since then her work has moved into fast paced fiction with horror and paranormal inspired themes.

  Connect with Arrvada online at:

  Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ArrvadaWriter?ref=ts

  Blog: https://arrvada.com/