by Gareth Wood
Corrone's house was a bungalow, a single floor with three bedrooms and a detached garage in the alley. It was neatly kept, Reilly observed. The grass was cut, but not recently. Shrubs were trimmed back, and the house was painted white with blue trim around the windows. There was a white picket fence. It looked, if anything, desperately normal.
"Jenkins, Fong, head around back. Carrie, with me in the front. Remember, armed and dangerous, but I really want him alive," Reilly said as they approached the front gate in the fence. He lifted a hand and opened the gate as quietly as possible, and the deputies slipped into the yard.
"Go in thirty," he said, and Fong and Deputy Gary Jenkins ran for the back. Carrie moved to his left side.
The report the Sheriff had read about the search of the warehouse was very interesting. He'd had time to read it over while the deputies had geared up for the raid. A pallet in the back had been found, covered in a tarp and full of some choice salvage items, none of it appearing on the official Essential Supplies’ lists. It was clear that someone was skimming off the top of the incoming salvage, which in the Safe Zone was a fairly serious crime. It might be motive enough for murder, but Reilly still suspected Corrone had something to do with the missing women. The suspicion sat in his gut, gnawing at him.
Together they stepped to either side of the front door, and Reilly gingerly tried the knob. As he expected it was locked. He looked at Deputy McAunaul. "Want to do the honours?"
Carrie grinned and hefted the door buster. She shouted, "Mission Sheriff's office! Open up!" and swung the pipe into the door between the handle and deadbolt. The big metal cylinder smashed the door open, bursting the frame like kindling. Reilly led the way while the deputy dropped the pipe and swung her shotgun up. Similar noises came from the back as Fong and Jenkins forced an entry there.
Reilly swung his handgun around the living room. He registered the furniture but was looking for living or undead threats, and saw none. They moved from room to room, one always covering the other. Fong covered Jenkins as they cleared the kitchen, and Reilly and Carrie started entering bedrooms. Reilly pushed the first door open while the shotgun was aimed to cover him. The room was small and empty save for a bed. A quick check showed no one was hiding under the bed or inside the closet. They moved on to the next room while Jenkins could be heard in the hallway, coming to assist. The other two bedrooms were cleared, and then the bathroom. The upper floor was empty and quiet.
"Clear!" Deputy Jenkins called.
"All clear, Sheriff," Carrie said, sounding disappointed.
Reilly turned on the balls of his feet, looking around. Something was missing. "Find the basement."
The entrance to the basement was in the back, just inside the back door. Reilly looked at it and knew something was wrong with it. A normal door inside a home wouldn't need the three serious locks and metal reinforcements this one had. He stopped in front of it and listened. Nothing. Reaching out, Reilly twisted the handle. It was firmly locked. He looked at the door again, closely. There was something…
"The deadbolts lock from this side," he remarked. That in itself wasn't unusual, but having three deadbolts like this one did might arouse suspicion. It certainly did now.
"Look here, boss," Carrie said, pointing out the rubber weather stripping all around the frame. Was it there to keep a chill or moisture out? Or was it for something else?
"The frame has been remounted. It opens inward," Fong said.
It was notable because doors like these usually opened toward the exit of the house. Why would Corrone have mounted the door this way?
"Jenkins, grab the door buster. Get this thing open. Carrie, you're on point, and be damned careful. Look for a light."
Jenkins took up the pipe, then the deputies got into position, covering the door while the Sheriff stepped back up to the kitchen. Jenkins swung the door buster back, and then slammed it into the top deadbolt cylinder. There was a smashing sound, but the door stayed shut. The deputy pulled back and swung into the second cylinder. This time the frame buckled, more wood splintered, but the door remained stubbornly shut.
"Third time’s the charm," Jenkins said, and swung back again. The door buster hit the third deadbolt like a hammer hitting a boiled egg. The frame exploded inward in small pieces, and the door swung forward into the basement stairwell. Carrie charged straight down into the dark, shotgun ahead of her, taking the steps two at a time as the wafting stench of decay flooded the upper floor. Jenkins gagged, covering his mouth with his hands. Fong followed Carrie down the stairs. He reached the third step as Carrie reached the bottom, and failed to hear the 'click' when he stepped down.
"Wait!" called the Sheriff, able to breathe again after coughing the stench out of his lungs. Reilly had heard the 'click' and was filled with dread as he heard a strange sound, a rattling followed by a metallic pinging. It sounded like chains being dropped onto and then dragged over concrete. He desperately wished that he had brought some working flashlights.
Carrie’s voice cried out from below: "Put your hands on your – OH SHIT!"
BLAM!
That was her Mossberg firing. Reilly was already charging down the stairs into the darkness, Jenkins behind him. He came to the bottom just as four shots rang out, Fong's handgun from the sound. A scream followed, and a terrible moaning sent chills up Reilly's spine. The screaming became constant. Ahead of him the Mossberg roared again, briefly illuminating a scene from hell itself. In the flash he saw what looked like several naked women grappling with Carrie, and another two attacking Fong. Strangely, the naked women appeared to have chains trailing from collars around their necks. The shotgun blast took the top of the head off one of the women, and the darkness returned, removing the sight but not the horrible wet sound of brains and blood splashing across the walls and ceiling. The stench of rot and gunpowder mixed to make Reilly gag again. Suddenly Jenkins loomed out of the darkness, yelling in panic.
"Run, Sheriff! Dead fucks everywhere!" Jenkins fled up the stairs toward the light. A gunshot erupted ahead of him, near the floor. Fong, trying to fight off the two undead women attacking him. His shot hit one woman in the neck, but missed the critical headshot. Reilly heard him scream again, but it cut off quickly and wetly, followed by the sound of chewing.
"Jenkins! Get back here!"
The shotgun pumped and blasted again, knocking another of the dead women away from Carrie. Over the ringing in his ears the Sheriff could hear Carrie yelling incoherently. He turned to where Fong was and fired a shot, used the brief light to correct and fired again into the head of the nearest undead woman. Fong wasn't moving anymore, and his blood was all over the floor.
No no no!
"JENKINS!" the Sheriff shouted.
BLAM! Another shotgun blast blew a window open, and a small bit of light flooded the room, and Reilly realised the windows had been taped and painted black. It wasn't much light, but it was enough. Deputy Fong was dead, one of his attackers still chewing on him. The other had slumped over him, her head burst open by the heavy slug from Reilly's gun. Carrie struggled with another naked dead woman, and Reilly was horrified to see that it was Jillian Sinclair. Blood poured down Carrie's face from scratches and gouges, and she swung the shotgun like a club into the face of the zombie. The other dead woman was getting up, her breasts blasted apart and hanging in shreds where the shot had torn her up and knocked her away. She started toward Reilly, and he saw that it was Karen Gilbert, dead a long time. Reilly lifted his handgun and fired twice, both bullets slamming into her forehead. Karen's body fell away as he twisted toward Carrie, still grappling with Jillian. Reilly watched in horror as Jillian's teeth clamped onto Carrie's neck, tearing flesh and splashing blood.
"Carrie!" the Sheriff yelled, his heart thudding in his chest. Carrie screamed and shoved the dead woman away, then swung her shotgun up and pressed it to Jillian's sternum. She pulled the trigger, blasting a hole clean through, severing the spine, making the zombie lose its balance and fall. Carrie fell backward
then, clutching at her neck, dropping her Mossberg. Reilly shot Jillian where she fell, bullets entering her face and spraying grey matter across the floor.
The last of the undead women, badly decomposed and bloody from her feast, was advancing on him. Cold, dead fingers clutched at his arm, and he spun around and shoved at the undead thing. Pushing his gun up under the creature’s chin he pulled the trigger three times. The top of her head burst, and the creature died, its blackened blood and putrid brains spraying the low ceiling.
In the sudden silence Reilly stood shocked at the complete carnage that had enveloped the room. Blood, some red and fresh, most old and black and putrefied, was liberally sprayed across almost every surface. Reilly himself was speckled with it, over his clothes and skin.
Fong moved, just raised his head off the ground and turned toward the Sheriff. His mouth stretched open in hunger, and Reilly fired twice more. Deputy Fong was dead, his throat ripped out and his belly opened up like a sardine can. The fact that he reanimated so quickly meant the story about the undead coming back faster must be true.
A pained gasp returned his attention to his other deputy, and he hurried to Carrie's side.
"Oh God," he said, his voice nearly breaking. There was so much blood. He didn't know where to put his hands. She was bleeding heavily from a bite to her throat, and from scratches on her face and neck. She was breathing and awake, and clutching her throat with both hands. Panic filled her eyes, and she stared at Reilly, unable to find words.
"Hold on, Carrie," he said, his voice calmer as he forced himself to think, "let's get you out of here."
The deputy choked, spit out blood and winced at the pain. Reilly picked her up, adrenaline letting him easily lift her from the floor, and he carried her in his arms up the steps. At the top he lowered her feet to the ground, and spotted Jenkins outside, throwing up and crying next to the fence.
He helped Carrie outside into the fresh air, breathing deeply to clear the stench of decay out of his nostrils. A medium sized cedar in the front yard was a convenient spot to lower her down, and he helped her rest against the trunk.
First aid was useless, he knew. The bleeding from her throat was going to kill her soon. She was already very pale, her life's blood pumping out through her clutching hands. The blood was everywhere, on Reilly's jacket and vest and hands, on Carrie's uniform, running down her arms. Reilly's heart broke at the realisation that Corrone had just killed two more of his deputies.
"That's… better…" Carrie said, her voice mangled and barely intelligible. "Thanks, boss…"
"Jesus, Carrie, don't try to talk," he said, hauling the morphine injector out of his first aid kit. He pushed it into her leg.
"Aaah, shit, boss," she murmured as the morphine entered her system, "I knew it… damn…"
"Knew what?" he asked. Her colour was extremely pale now, her skin almost white. The blood was pulsing less urgently. She didn't have long.
She whispered something, and Reilly leaned forward to hear it. She spoke so quietly that it was barely audible. "Get him… get the… fucker…"
"I will, I promise," he said, rage and grief warring in his head. He held her hand until she was gone, then stood back and raised his weapon.
INTERLUDE FIVE
UBC Students Union building, November 8, 2004
Elena Girenko sat in the darkness, listening to the rain beating steadily against her room windows, and shivered. The unending rain, falling incessantly from the sky. Would it never stop? Would the world be washed away and submerged forever? It had been raining almost constantly for months now, from fine drizzle to torrential downpours, and the flooding that had likely occurred in the cities of the Fraser Valley would be catastrophic.
One of the other survivors, a geology student, had offered the opinion one day that the rain was caused by fine particulate matter that had been released into the atmosphere from fires and explosions. When this outbreak had started, the fires left unchecked in cities around the world and the explosions of oil refineries and nuclear power plants had sent millions, if not billions of tons of dust up into the air. Now it was all falling back down on the University Grounds, it seemed.
Elena stared around at her unused lab equipment. She hadn't touched anything in days. The experiments and investigation were over, forgotten, abandoned. The rain beating against the world left her unable to concentrate. What was the point, anyhow? There was nothing to find. Without proper equipment she couldn't see a virus or anything else. Not even a bacteria or parasite had shown itself to her in the months she had spent looking.
The plague victims baffled her. To all appearances they were dead, but that was impossible. They still moved around, despite tissue necrosis and injuries that would normally have been fatal. How they did it, how whatever agent had infected them managed this, she simply did not know.
So if they were alive, but appeared to be dead, wasn't that a logical inconsistency? If live cells could be infected by the agent, but no agent was clearly visible, wasn't that logically inconsistent too? Elena was beginning to get a headache, a powerful one blooming deep inside her skull as she sat shivering and pondering the impossible.
She suspected that the word itself, 'impossible', was losing all meaning.
Hardly anyone came to see her anymore. The students were all busy building weapons or planting vegetables in the indoor greenhouse they had cobbled together inside the common room. Or talking. Endlessly talking.
Only the athletic scholarship, Todd, or the astrophysics student, Robyn, came up to see her anymore, and Elena barely noticed when they did. They brought her down to dinner sometimes, coming to collect her when she forgot to eat.
Todd was kind to her despite her appalling behaviour toward him, and both he and Robyn treated her respectfully. Respect wasn't something she had expected from a jock. She'd have to write a nice letter to the faculty about him, to go in his files.
Elena shook her head sadly. She'd forgotten again that there was no more faculty. She was the only full professor left on the UBC campus, as far as she knew.
Am I dreaming? Is this all a grand imagining that my mind has come up with? Is any of this real? If it is, I don't want to do it anymore.
For some time she continued to gaze out the windows, the view entirely blurred by the water running down the outside. There was no light out there. The electricity was long gone, and the stars and moon were forever blotted out of sight by clouds. Finally, an hour later, Elena stirred. She rose on cramped legs, grasping the chair for support, and stretched her spine. Then, guided by an instinct that she knew on some level was suicidal, she pulled on her knitted shawl and left her makeshift lab for the last time.
Down the stairs, one cautious flight after another, as fast as her weary and aged body could manage, she came to ground level. She pushed the door open to outside, within the fenced-in enclave of safety that the students and staff had worked so hard to build, and stepped out into the rain. In seconds she was soaked to the skin by the icy water falling from the damaged heavens.
MacInnes Field had been converted into gardens for vegetables. The unending rains had washed away many of the seeds, but a few very hardy plants grew in the mud. A few areas were covered by plastic sheets, but this did little to protect the soil from the constant water. Elena crossed the gardens, walking above the mud on stones that were laid down when this had still been a lawn. By luck she wasn't seen by any of the sentries; they were on the opposite side of the enclave, in the athletic center, as Elena approached the gate.
She wasn't sure what she was going to do even then, but she knew that she was done. Fruitless investigation and deep despair that she only now realised held her in its iron grip had led her to this. But what was this? She stood and looked through the fence into the darkness beyond. Nothing moved within sight, but it was so dark that she couldn't see much anyway. The gate waited, a chain-link and plywood swinging door held in place by a small length of chain and a combination lock. Her fingers dialed the com
bination, and she pulled the chain out of the links and dropped it into the mud.
Elena pushed the gate open and stepped out onto the street. She shivered, looking around at what the world had become. There was debris and garbage everywhere, wind and water having pushed piles into other piles. Abandoned cars acted as natural barriers, collecting huge drifts of water-logged books and newspapers and clothing and other unidentifiable things. And bones. There were bones on the ground, human bones long stripped of any flesh, and crumbling under the constant rain.
There were none of the plague victims nearby, in fact none were in sight at all. Forgetting to close the gate behind her, Elena set off randomly to the left, looking around in stunned wonder at the remnants of technology and education that littered everywhere she cast her eye. She continued along the street in the darkness, barely aware that the rain had nearly stopped for the first time in many weeks, or that the moon was beginning to shine through the breaking clouds, illuminating her way.
At the intersection ahead of her she found them. Ten or so figures stood in a group near the bus shelters, and it was only then that Elena felt the first misgivings. Was this the right choice? Would it hurt? She hoped it would be fast, and made no move to retreat, fully committed to her chosen course of action now.
As she stepped forward the figures somehow became aware of her. A very tall one in the filthy remains of a lab coat led the group toward her, each of them noticing his movement and following. The tall figure looked familiar to her, and she squinted through tired eyes, trying to see. When he came closer she saw that she was right, she did recognise him. He was a biologist that she had co-authored a paper with some years ago, a nice man with a lovely wife who made origami.