The Apocalypse Crusade (Book 1): War of the Undead Day One

by Peter Meredith

  “Stop right there, Bill!” Reynolds tried one last time. The other officers didn’t know what to think. They could see Bill just fine and he looked horrible, but just like their sergeant they weren’t going to shoot a friend out of hand.

  With a grimace, Reynolds stuck his gun in his holster. Bill was on him a second later. It took five of the officers to pin him, but before they could cuff him the sounds of their fighting brought others who looked and acted just like him. First it was a pair of sorority girls, clawing and snarling. One latched herself onto Shadrick and though he was literally twice her size he found that she was impossible to shake off without resorting to overwhelming force.

  He caught up one of the girl's arms, torqued it up behind her back, and then slammed her into a wall face first. At the very least she should’ve been stunned; the breath should’ve been knocked from her body and she should’ve crumpled to the floor. Instead of any of that, she spun in his grip and sank her teeth into his chest latching onto his bullet resistant vest.

  Forgetting protocol, he grabbed a handful of hair and pried the sorority girl off of him. Holding her at arm’s length, like a spitting cat, he cocked his arm back, prepared to cave her face in with one punch, however a gunshot stopped him.

  The sound paused the fight just long enough for him to see that others had joined the bizarre brawl, many others. Cops and students, all dripping goo from their eyes were everywhere. Most weren’t fighting the nine officers, there were so many of them that they were fighting to get at the nine officers. Reynolds, in front was buried beneath a pile of bodies. Right behind him, McCurry was pinned against a wall and there was what looked like a fountain of blood coming up out of him.

  At the rear of their nine-person string Dave Morganstern was the man who'd fired his gun. He was wild eyed and shaking. There was a body at his feet. Unlike how the police are portrayed in the movies, no cop ever wants to fire his piece, especially at someone unarmed, it usually meant the death of his career; just then it was his life he feared for. The sound of the gun had drawn a dozen black eyes to him.

  He was rushed and before he got two more shots off he was brought down, screaming curses. The officer next to Dave started blazing away with his 9mm. Astonishingly, the people jerked and blood flew but they kept coming.

  All of the officers who saw this scrambled desperately for their weapons. Shadrick felt an overwhelming need to wiz in his pants--his gun was caught on something and didn't slide free until it was almost too late. He had the sorority girl clawing at his arm, pulling the skin back like she was peeling a banana and just in front of him was some college kid, no longer looking like a fresh-faced sophomore as he had when he'd woken that morning. He looked like death.

  Shadrick's gun cleared his holster with the sophomore two steps away. He pulled the trigger directly into the things chest. The bullet tore through his right lung, sending pieces of bone and black lung spraying out behind him. The sophomore didn't blink, he just kept on coming, lunging like a drunken dancer and when he tore into Shadrick, the sophomore didn't bite into the vest.

  His teeth crunched down on the side of Shadrick's jaw, cutting through the flesh easily and gouging the bone. The policemen did what came naturally, he screamed in terror and pain. He shot three times into the sophomore. The angle was an odd one so the bullets transfixed him from side to side leaving tunnels from one end of his body to the other.

  Still the zombie bit and ripped with his bloody teeth. The pain was so intense that Shadrick couldn't think straight. Forgetting the gun he twisted his face away from those awful teeth, inadvertently exposing his neck to the zombie. The beast saw the beckoning flesh with its wonderfully strong pulse lying just beneath. It ignored the bullets slamming into his body, in fact they didn't even register as happening to him. All he cared about was his thirst.

  He went for the throat.

  Through the pain, Shadrick could feel his life gurgling up out of his flesh, strangely, it felt as though he was a boat with a leak. He was sinking. Sinking beneath warm red water.

  5

  Perhaps the busiest person in the state was Courtney Shaw. Sitting in the trooper station she was like the hub of a bicycle wheel that had sprouted a thousand spokes.

  Before the CDC people had stopped transmitting, being mostly dead as they were, Courtney's night as a New York State police dispatcher had been hectic, but when the Poughkeepsie station went silent, her life became pure chaos, and each minute grew so hectic that she forgot to breathe at times.

  Pemberton was stuck on the phone trying to explain a situation that was spiraling out of control. What was worse, he was forced to repeat himself over and over again, first to his boss, Major Billups, and then to Major Billups' boss, Lieutenant Colonel Parks. He then had to explain it all once again to the personal assistant to Gavin Ross, the superintendent of the New York State Police and not twenty minutes later to Ross himself.

  After that he had to deal with the politicians. Every mayor, town manager and city council member from every little hamlet and village within a hundred miles demanded to know what was happening. Then there were the myriad of officials from the governor's office who had to be convinced that what was happening wasn't a hoax. Eventually, Pemberton was getting calls from congressional staffers.

  With him tied up and with troopers heading in every direction, it fell to Courtney to direct operations; no one else had a handle on what was going on. Her first act was to call every trooper station in the state and beg for more men. She then put a call into the CDC in Atlanta to tell them the bad news that another team...another two teams had to be sent out--clearly the insanity occurring in Poughkeepsie had to be related to what was happening at the Walton Facility.

  While on hold with the CDC, she took a look at her map and sighed. Using a red marker, she drew a circle that encompassed both Walton and Poughkeepsie. Within the circle were fourteen townships, with Poughkeepsie the largest. She estimated there were 40,000 people living in that circle.

  "Mother of God," she whispered.

  Renee punched her in the leg. "Grab a freaking line. I'm getting killed here." The lights on the board were going nuts. There had to be a hundred people on hold.

  "I can't. I have to call the governor." Pemberton's call earlier had been met with a not so polite: Thanks. Keep me informed. Who knew how many dead troopers there were and that was the Governor's response? Pemberton had thrown his coffee mug at the wall and had gone on a profanity-laced tirade that could be heard out in the parking lot.

  "The governor?" Renee asked, incredulously. "Don't be stupid, that's Pemberton's job. Your job is to help me with all these freaking calls. Look at the board! Poughkeepsie is going crazy." It had been a half hour since anyone had heard thing one from the police in Poughkeepsie. "I'm getting like twenty calls a minute. Some of them say there are cannibals roaming the streets. Not zombies, Court, but cannibals." Her eyes were just as round as they could be.

  Courtney glanced again at her map with the big red circle--the station was not a quarter-mile from the edge. "You're going to have to handle it, Renee." She reached for the phone and dialed the governor's home line and was proud to see that her hands were steady.

  "Governor Stimpson, please" she said curtly when the phone was picked up. "This is Courtney Shaw with the New York State Police."

  A man had answered; he sounded extremely starched and formal. "The governor is currently hosting a dinner party with..."

  "I don't give a rat's ass," Courtney snapped. "Get him on the phone, now! Or I'll be calling the media next to tell them that sucking up to fat cat donors is more important to him than protecting the people who elected him."

  "I see," the man said and then laid down the phone. Courtney could hear part of a muffled conversation on the other end of the line. She grew more and more nervous with every second, but when she heard: Tell them I'm busy, she grew frosty again.

  The stiff man--she pictured a butler in coat and tails--came on again, but before he could s
ay anything, she said, "I forgot to mention this call is being recorded as was your entire conversation with the governor and it will be made part of the public record in five minutes."

  "Oh...uh, one moment, please."

  Stimpson came on the line a minute later. "Who the fuck is this?" he demanded at full volume.

  "My name is Courtney Shaw," she answered, unfazed at his bluster. "I'm a dispatcher with the state police, section K. You need to call up the guard."

  "What the fuck is this? You gonna tell me how to do my fucking job? A lowly dispatcher? A fucking nobody? What do you really want? I was told you got some sort of tape. Big fucking deal. Listen up bitch, I appointed the attorney general. He's not gonna listen..."

  "Will you shut up!" she yelled into the phone. Next to her Renee was as still as a statue. She looked to be made of brittle porcelain that was on the verge of shattering.

  The governor paused for half a second. "Sure, sure. Dig your own fucking grave."

  "If you listen to me, you might be able to save you own ass, Governor. You need to call out the guard right this minute. The quarantine around Walton didn't hold. They're in Poughkeepsie now and if you don't act fast, who knows where they'll turn up next."

  There was enough urgency in her voice to cause the governor to hold back his next curse-filled diatribe. "Look, I know about Poughkeepsie. I received an update from some sergeant named Pemberbrook, or something, forty minutes ago. He said they recalled their officers and that they were handling it."

  "But..."

  "But nothing. I also had one of my aides contact the local P. D. They said it was a brawl at a bar. So you see, Miss, I'm doing my job. The situation is under control."

  "I'm sorry, but it's not under control," she insisted. "The Poughkeepsie police aren't picking up. Something terrible happened there. And something bad is happening at the local hospital, Saint Francis. The last call I had was there were eight confirmed deaths. We are sure it’s..." Did she dare use the word zombie to the governor? No, she didn't dare. "We are sure, uh, that it’s infected people from Walton doing this. Probably some janitor or family member slipped out of the quarantine before it was fully secure."

  "Eight deaths?" he asked, quietly.

  "Yes, sir."

  "That's not a lot. It's sad don't get me wrong, but it's not enough to call out the National Guard over. We're talking millions of dollars just to mobilize a few battalions."

  She didn't know how many men were in a battalion, however she knew it wouldn't be enough. "Would three hundred deaths be enough? That's my current estimate including everyone at Walton. It could be higher. We're getting calls from all over Poughkeepsie asking if there's a battle going on."

  "Three hundred, Jesus...I'll need to confirm this."

  Courtney didn't think there was time to play that game. "Who would you confirm it with? Superintendent Ross? All that will happen is he'll need to confirm it with, Lieutenant Colonel Parks, and he'll have to confirm it with Major Billups, who'll call Sergeant Pemberton, who'll ask me. You can't afford to waste any more time, Governor. You need to listen to me."

  He blew out a sigh. "Look, I wish I could, only there are channels to work through. I appreciate your, uh zest in this matter and I can assure you I will be calling Ross just as soon as we hang up."

  "You're wasting time!" she pleaded.

  "Yes, and now so are you." The governor didn't wait for a response. With another sigh he thumbed off the phone and then stared at it, thinking about the fucked up day he was having. "But the guard? Really?" Had it come to that point already? He didn't know and he didn't like being the man on the spot. Yes, he was governor, but he had a whole slew of aides just so he didn't have to make a decision. Not a real one. They'd present him with all the facts he would need to cover his ass one way or the other.

  The governor straightened his tie before heading back to his party, pausing on the way to speak to his assistant. "I want the entire crew in house, in thirty minutes. No excuses. And get Ross on the line again. And that new guy, what's his name? Schemmel? From the Department of Health. Also, I'll want the Attorney General, and someone from the CDC who can explain what the hell is going on."

  The calls were made and the meeting set and then delayed when the Attorney General couldn’t be found. Eventually an assistant was located who could be expected to cover the governor’s ass if things went to shit. The meeting moved ponderously along because the governor was clear on one thing: he wasn't going to be blamed for anything. The attitude was contagious. When Superintendent Ross was put on the spot concerning the current state of the calamity, he called his second in command, who called Pemberton directly, who ran down the hall to the dispatch room and asked Courtney Shaw.

  One hour and thirty-seven minutes after Courtney begged the governor to call out the guard, he made his informed decision. "We'll call out the guard," he said after taking a consensus and putting it on record.

  Another twenty-three minutes slipped away before a snoring Major General Horace Collins was poked awake by his wife. By that time the number of infected people had shot past the six-hundred mark.

  6

  Anna wanted to set her fire and go; the quicker the better, only there seemed to be an ungodly number of zombies wandering around the halls and stairs. They seemed to be in every nook and cranny. “Get them out of here,” she ordered Von Braun.

  “Why?” he growled.

  “Because you don’t want to have to share do you?”

  “Share what?” He was easily confused.

  She scoffed at his moronic answer, momentarily forgetting the delicate balance of power she held over him. His quick glare reminded her. “You know, Dr. Lee and the cure. There aren't a lot of the cures. Not enough for all of them.”

  He looked at the other zombies with a sneer. He hated them almost as much as he hated Anna. “What am I supposed to do with them?”

  She thought on it for a moment. “Get them all down to the lobby. All except a few to guard the stairs.” She could see his slow mind working and before he could ask why, she said, “To keep Dr. Lee from escaping. You don't want her to escape, do you?"

  That was an especially tough question for Von Braun to answer because Anna's shit-fuck of a condescending voice had gone right to where his head was blackest and really he could barely remember Dr. Lee just then, not when this soft, pure, tasty treat was so close.

  "Remember the cure!" she snapped, backing away. He followed after her, backing her almost into the elevator where there was no room to run. Again, the cure seemed like a distant thing to him, while she was so close, so haveable, so edible.

  “What about your pills?" she asked as a last resort, holding up the bottle and rattling it to distract him. “If you hurt me, you’ll end up like all of them. You’ll be a freak just like them.” She pointed with her chin at the hated zombies. He had his pressure points just like all men.

  He sneered at them, too. “You want them in the lobby?”

  “Yes, until the time is right. Then we’ll turn them loose.” It was her one way to get by the police. It would be dangerous as hell, but she didn’t have many choices. Or any choice, really. She had begun to fervently believe that what was happening wasn’t her fault. It was all fate. She was only playing her role.

  Von Braun left to do her bidding. Anna didn’t wait around to watch, she punched the “B” button. As before the elevator screeched and shook on its cable as it began to descend. She rode the car down to the basement. When the doors opened, she didn't rush out; she stood just inside the elevator, breathing as lightly as could, trying to hear anything that might sound like one of the zombies.

  After a minute she crept out of the elevator, but only took a few steps before the door began to close behind her. Quickly, she jumped back and held the door open. “Son of a bitch,” she whispered, taking off one of her shoes and jamming it in the crevice. “That was close.” She didn’t want to think about what would have happened if it had slid all the way to the top fl
oor. Her plans would've been ruined for one and she'd be jailed for two.

  "Don't think about that," she hissed. "Concentrate!"

  Anna pictured the gas lines and the ovens on the third floor and realized that she was going to start a hell of a big gas fire and the one thing she couldn’t have was it lighting prematurely. That meant no sparks and really the only way she’d get sparks on a deserted floor was through some sort of electrical short. She went to the breakers.

  “Beautiful,” she whispered at the sight. She had never in her life seen a set of breakers so well laid out and so perfectly marked in her life. The first thing she did was to kill the electricity to the fourth floor. “That’ll fuck with any plans they might have," she said, gleefully. Next she snapped the breakers down on the third floor.

  The cafeteria had six very large gas ovens—it would have been her next destination if a zombie hadn’t come gimping toward her just then. It was between her and the elevator.

  Without thinking, she began to race away, only she’d forgotten she had been going about with just one shoe on. It put her at an odd slant and made for a painfully slow get away. She ran in a hitching, hopping manner for the boilers where she hoped the maze of machinery, pipes, and shadows would conceal her.

  Anna tried to hide herself within it all, but the zombie was too close. As she ran she could hear its breath wheezing in and out and she could imagine she felt the heat of it on the back of her neck. A scream was a second away from ripping up out of her throat when she saw a door along the wall that was partially open; she headed right for it and slammed it shut behind her. The zombie struck it a second later with such force that it jarred the breath out of her.

  "Shit," she whined. She had her back to the door and through it she could feel the beast punching at the wood. It was a cheap door with a hollow core—but it held against the single zombie.