Section I. Dead End
1
Just beyond Shepard Park, west of the city of Waterloo, lies the suburbs. On the quiet street of west 8th birds chirp their songs while squirrels scamper and chase one another. The mid-morning sun warms away the frost from the night before. It is on this street that a man runs in the chilly November air.
His heart throbs in his ears so loudly it is all he can hear. The rapid thud overpowers the sound of the birds and the chattering squirrels. It drowns out the repeating plod of his heavy footfalls, the urgent pace of a desperate man.
Taking in large gulps of brisk air, the breaths leave his mouth in thin trails of steam. His face is set in a panic induced grimace, mouth agape to allow as much oxygen into his lungs as possible. Sweat beads upon his forehead despite the cold. His only companion is a dull ache below the ribs on his left side that sharpens with every step.
Striding along, the man looks back to see if they are still behind him. He knows that they are. He has been running like this for a while and their presence hasn’t wavered. He needs time to catch his breath. Time to think. Gauging their distance he decides to risk it. They’re slow. I can make up the time.
The pursuers are about ten houses back as he slows his pace. He throws his hands over his head, each clasps tightly to its opposing forearm, as they taught them in boot camp. Something about the blood pooling? He tries to remember. Not passing out? He gives up that train of thought as he looks around the neighborhood. There are a lot of nice homes that he doesn’t have time to admire. He is looking for more of them. They seem to be everywhere.
The man places his hands on his camouflage clad knees as he tries to allow his heart to slow. The strong muscle contracts with such force that his body is shaking. As he leans forward his rifle slips from his shoulder and dangles by his ankles, the strap caught at his wrist. He just looks at the weapon, too weak to fuss with it and decides to just let it hang there. Right now, he just wants to breathe.
This is Dan Williamson, a corporal in the National Guard, and as far as he knows the last of his unit. He straightens up facing his oppressors. They are making slow and steady progress towards him. The man runs a palm over his close cropped blonde hair. There are so many of them, hundreds by his estimate. How many of them do I know? He asks himself. In the distance he can see a few of them wear identical uniforms to his own; his men. They had joined the other side. Of course it was not their intention to treason. They are dead. But, for some unknown reason the dead are not staying that way today.
He got the call to duty at around six that morning. Units were being activated. They had to report to the recruiting depot for supplies and orders. Dan’s unit was to aid the police in riot control. They clearly failed. All he wants now is to get home.
He decides he should get moving again. The thought makes his legs ache. He is weighed down with gear he doesn’t dare discard. Over his uniform blouse is a heavy flak jacket that holds his body heat in, roasting him. He can feel the steam rise from below his collar.
The exhausted soldier turns away from the horde of walking dead. Ahead of him two cars are parked in the street blocking the road. As Dan gets closer he sees the two had collided as they pulled from their respective driveways. They were abandoned, just left in the road. Probably trying to get out of the city, Dan surmises. Where are the owners now? He asks himself, creeping closer to the wreck.
The driver side door of a blue compact is open. Dan looks in and sees a set of keys dangling from the ignition. Leaning in he turns them. Nothing. The tank must be dry, he contends. Although he believes the other car will yield the same results he has to try it anyway. He ventures around the wreck quickly. Dan doesn’t like how close the mass of walking corpses is getting, just four houses away. He has seen what they do.
Dan is taken aback as he rounds the sedan. A figure rises to its feet. He wears a nice black business suit and aside from the blood smeared across his mouth he looks relatively normal. Dan sees where the blood came from. The zombie was eating a paperboy who lies on the pavement. Bundles of the daily news are strewn about the scene.
In his haste Dan almost drops his rifle. He hates losing the precious bullet as he squeezes the trigger, he doesn’t have that many to spare. The zombie advances on the soldier as its head snaps backwards. A single round plows into his face just below his nose, exiting through the back of his skull. The body crumples to the ground next to the paperboy.
The army of zombies is getting closer. Ahead Dan sees a few coming at him. He feels trapped. His M-16 only has two shots left. He decides to dart onto one of the lawns to evade the dead.
The soldier takes the first step only to fall forward onto the road. His leg is caught by something. Prone, the soldier pulls on his leg but it is firmly ensnared. He looks back and sees the newsy has both hands around his combat boot. The young zombie is trying to pull the leg to its open and ready mouth. The deceased boy begins to gnaw on the heel of Dan’s boot. The soldier can feel its powerful and starved jaws trying to tear through. Dissatisfied with the shoe leather, the boy is heading up to the man’s calf.
Dan can’t pull free and there are two more heading at him with the same goal as the horde closing the distance behind him. The dead moan in a melancholy choir. The sound gets louder and louder adding to Dan’s anxiety, driving the soldier to the point of panic. A hot prickly sensation runs up his back. Dan fights to free his leg, managing only to drag the lightweight zombie along the street. He gets to his knees and drives the butt of his rifle into the youth’s head until the dead boy goes limp.
Dan scrambles away in a frantic crawl. Once he is able to stand he sprints around the living dead, evading their grasp as they reach for him. One of the groping corpses, the neighborhood’s postman, turns to watch his breakfast getting away and clumsily trips over his own feet, stumbling to the ground.
Dan is once again running. He runs as he did before. Hope drives him, hope of living long enough to see his wife again. He heads deeper down west 8th attempting to open the doors of cars parked along the street and in driveways. They are all locked. Even here, He thinks. There is no trust anymore. He doubts he can hotwire one anyway. I don’t know how and there’s no time to learn. His only option is to run. The path ahead looks clear. Behind him the dead clog the street, the swarm spills into the yards that flank it. All of them have the same solitary ambition, to eat.
2
“They’re not zombies!” A skinny redheaded boy says adamantly.
“Yes, they are!” Responds a portly dark-haired boy.
“They are not. They are humans infected with rage.”
The pair of 16-year-olds are in the basement of 22 West 8th. Any outsider entering the subterranean space it would describe it as dark, musty, and quite depressing. It smells of stale pizza, and dirty laundry, with a subtle hint of body odor. To the current inhabitants, the regulars, it’s heaven.
“They are zombies, Stevie. Trust me.” The heavier of the two, Derek, tries to convince his friend.
“Why, because you listened to the commentary track? The director may have done a ‘take on’ zombies, but they are not zombies. Zombies are reanimated corpses that eat flesh. Becka, tell him.”
Among the bickering boys is a girl that Stevie pleads with for backup. She is an oddity in the dank cellar, among the trash and piles of clothes, the action figures proudly on display, and the comprehensive comic book collection. She stands out here because of how well she blends in with the world above. She is popular up there. She is beautiful.
“I don’t care. Can we just play?” Becka asks, exasperated by their debate. “This is worse than your fight over which would win in a race between the Enterprise and the Millennium Falcon.”
The thre
e have been friends ever since elementary school and have remained close despite Becka’s rise in the high school hierarchy.
“Sorry, Becka.” Stevie apologizes, turning his attention away from the gore being displayed on a small television. On the screen people scream, running for their lives while rising music plays to increase the movie’s tension.
“Yeah, me too.” Derek adds his remorse.
“It’s alright. Where were we?” She asks.
Derek clears his throat as he consults a sheet of graph paper. “The two of you were about to enter the cavern of shadows. Ahead of you looms…”
“We did that already.” Stevie interrupts.
“Yeah, I thought we were deep in the forest of mystery.” Becka adds.
Derek is flustered as he scans through his papers. Fittingly his turn as dungeon master takes place in his dungeon of a bedroom.
“You suck as DM.” Stevie jabs.
“Shut up.” Derek's face is getting red. When he gets embarrassed he always starts to feel warm. Sweat is beading through his pores giving him an uncomfortable feeling all over his body.
“God,” Becka stands up and stretches. “We’ve been at this campaign for two days now.” Her arms are extended over her head causing her shirt to lift up, revealing her taut stomach. Stevie notices, but tries to act as if he hasn’t.
“I need a shower. Derek, do you mind?”
“No, go ahead.” He responds, still pondering the storyline he had written for them to play out.
“Be back in a minute.” Becka says as she starts up the stairs.
Derek gives up his searching to join Stevie in watching her depart. Both boys have been in love with her for years, long before she had blossomed. They hate themselves for picturing her in the shower just then, what they hate more is the fact they must keep their friendship a secret, for Becka’s sake.
Becka hates the secrecy as well. It isn’t fair to Stevie and Derek to be ignored when her popular friends are around. She would much rather be with her boys. These clandestine weekends are her only escape from the pressured world of popularity. She had to fake a knee injury to get out of cheerleading just to be here. The three friends should be in first period now, but thanks to a teachers’ conference they have the day off.
Becka is on the first floor of Derek’s house. All of the curtains are drawn. His mom must have gone to work already, she concludes. She walks through the kitchen and out into the dining room, passing the front door on her way to the stairs. She is halfway up when she remembers she wanted to look out the window to see the accident they had heard earlier. Becka turns but decides she can just look at it on the way back down.
She locks the bathroom door behind her before undressing. She wishes she had brought in her change of clothes. They are in her car as usual; she always forgets to grab them. It’s too late now, she figures while tossing her worn clothes on the pink fluff covered toilet. She isn’t about to go out and get them.
Derek and Stevie sit in silence at the round card table. A loud pop had rung out from the street above them, but they hadn’t cared enough to look. They figured it was a car backfiring, or something. They are more intent on listening as water rushed from the hot water heater in the corner of Derek’s den.
“One of us should make a move.” Stevie says finally.
“I’m trying to figure it out.” Derek returns to his papers.
“I don’t mean the game. I mean with Becka. You or I should make a move.” Stevie explains.
Derek looks up from his notes at his bespeckled friend. They often have this talk. “We don’t have a chance. We don’t have ‘moves’ even if we wanted to make one.”
“She deserves better than those jock-ass douche bags she dates. We’re her friends.”
“Not really. Not as far as anyone else knows.”
“We know. That’s enough for me.”
Derek considers what Stevie has said. He would love to be her boyfriend, but the painful truth always dousing that dream, he and Stevie are beneath her.
Becka turns off the water and steps out of the shower onto a pink bath mat that matches the toilet seat cozy. She wipes the steam off of a full-length mirror and admires herself. She loves to look at what puberty and cheerleading has done for her physique. She is svelte and sleek like a cat. Every aspect toned to tight perfection.
She often compares what she looks like now to how she once looked. She was a late bloomer in junior high; flat chested, face all bumpy. She was made fun of a lot by all the guys who now want her. The only ones who were ever true to her are down in the basement. They are her only real friends. Sadly no one outside the trio will ever know.
She wraps her long black hair in a towel as she thinks of her fake friends, her vapid cheerleader pals. She hates them. She hates their backstabbing, two-faced ways and their cattiness. She hates the stupid things they say with their primitive brains.
The smell of Becka’s clothes makes her nose crinkle. She realizes as she puts the garments on, she could never wear them around her faux friends. No way, only around my boys. The brilliant nerds she adores, who can speak fluent Klingon, and make her feel special.
3
The solitary soldier continues his trek along west 8th. The pain in his side has evolved into a sharp stab, inhibiting his speed. Glancing back Dan figures he should be all right as long as he just keeps a safe distance from the cloud of zombies that tail him. The man looks ahead hoping to find a spot where he can hide. If I can just drop off their radar, maybe they’ll pass me by.
Lush hedges border an upcoming driveway. The strip of asphalt services house number 32 according to the black numbers on the mailbox. A red balloon hovers, tethered to the box by a thin string. Dan crouches below the greenery as he heads to the house. His hand goes to the knob and he is relieved to discover the front door is unlocked. He doesn’t hesitate as he slinks into the home.
The dead bolt is immediately thrown and he secures the lock on the knob. For an added measure of assurance he slides the chain lock into place. Dan is on his knees staring at the door. He can hear their moaning. It’s getting louder as they approach. To the right of the door is a large window shrouded by a heavy beige curtain.
Apprehensive fingers lift the thick fabric, trying carefully not to be seen. A small gash of light is made, a sliver that he peers through. The two zombies he had avoided earlier by the paperboy have entered the yard. They must have seen me come this way. Dan thinks while his stomach knots up. They’re looking for me.
The figures pause on uneasy feet. Their bodies sway as they slowly look around the yard. Dan can see their slack lifeless faces. One is a man, half dressed. His neck is bandaged with gauze that his blood had soaked through. He must have been getting ready for work, Dan thinks, noticing the left side of the guy’s face is covered in a dried lather of shaving cream. The other figure is a woman wearing jeans and a tee shirt. Her right forearm is gnawed to the bone.
The gaze of the undead passes the window and Dan ducks down. His chest aches with tension as he listens for them. He strains his ears to detect what is happening outside, expecting to hear them at the door any second. Clawing and moaning, looking for food.
The cowering soldier steels himself, gathers his courage and holds his breath like it is his last. He forces himself to look out again. His fingers work the fabric over the window creating a small porthole for him to see from.
His vision is obscured. Before he saw light, now all he can see is a shadow. It takes him a moment to realize it’s one of them standing before the thin pane of glass. Dan freezes as he looks at the body. It’s the man. His back is to the house. The soldier feels a wave of relief wash over him.
On the road, beyond the loitering zombie, Dan can see the horde passing by. The dead man on the lawn is watching the procession. He slowly begins to move, heading off to join the others. Dan watches him depart. The half dressed man has only a pair of pajama bottoms on. Not only was he bitten on the neck, it appears his right calf was
also some cadaver’s breakfast. The gray cloth is in tatters and stained red, most of the muscle is gone. The wound causes a pronounced limp. Dan knows the hobbling isn’t from the pain, they don’t feel pain.
All he has to go on is theory right now. Dan and his men found out by trial and error that only headshots will put them down for good. Body shots slow them, but not much. The virus, or plague, or whatever the hell is causing this, is transmissible by bite. You get bit, you turn into one, and you eat flesh. Just like the movies. Dan wishes this was just a movie.
4
Derek is fairly confident that he knows where they had left off before being side tracked by the debate. Now he has his head on the table while they wait for Becka to return. Stevie stares at the white dimpled panels of the ceiling as he absently rolls a pair of 20 sided dice on the table. Becka appears at long last. Her hair is wet and her shirt clings tightly to her damp body, accentuating her curves.
“I know where we are…” Derek starts to say, but he notices Becka has an expression on her face that tells him something more important is going on. It is a haunted look.
“Hey Becka,” Stevie starts to ask. “Did you hear something earlier? Like a loud popping sound? Could have been a car backfire, or a gunshot?”
Derek notices his friend’s ordinarily pretty face set in a mask of shock, like she had just seen a ghost. “Are you alright?”
“No. I mean, yeah. Come upstairs.” She turns and heads up without any more explanation, or even waiting to see if they follow.
No explanation is needed. The boys spring to their feet and follow the cheerleader up the steps. In the upstairs hall they see her briefly in the kitchen as she rounds the corner heading into the dining room. She leads them to the window that looks out to the street. Becka waves them in close to her, lowering her head in a secretive pose.
Life Among The Dead Page 1