Degeneration

by Mark Campbell

  There was a pause on the other line.

  “Falls Lake, who am I speaking with?”

  “Richard.”

  “Rank and number?”

  “No,” Richard muttered, “I’m no soldier.”

  There were murmurs in the background on the other end of the line.

  “Richard, is there somebody you can let me speak with, someone who is in charge?”

  Richard looked down at Yates’ corpse.

  “Everybody is dead. This trailer is surrounded by those things.”

  There was a pause on the other end and more murmuring in the background.

  “Who is this?” Richard asked.

  “Richard, you seem to be able to speak coherently, your voice doesn’t sound muffled by a respirator, and I don’t hear you coughing. Do you feel ill at all?”

  “No, I feel fine. That is the way it is supposed to be. You see, I can’t get sick because Andy is counting on me,” Richard said, staring at Andy in the corner.

  Andy nodded.

  “So… you’ve sealed yourself safely inside the trailer? Are you armed?”

  “Why?” Richard asked cautiously.

  “Sir, just– just stay where you are. Will you stay on the line with me for a while, Richard? Please?”

  “I can’t,” Richard said, matter-of-factly. “I have to go to Butner and save my brother. I am sorry.”

  “No! Richard, please, PLEASE just–just stay on the line and talk with me a–”

  Andy walked over, grabbed the phone out from Richard’s hand, and hung it up.

  The red phone started ringing again immediately.

  Andy pulled the cord out from the jack in the wall and the ringing ceased.

  “Enough talk,” Andy said flatly, “get to Butner and save me already.”

  Andy’s visage disappeared and Richard was left alone in the office holding the phone’s cord in his hand.

  Richard dropped the cord and opened the armory door.

  The door at the rear of the armory had been blown off by explosives and a cool outside breeze whistled into through the open doorway, covering everything in ash. The gun-racks were picked clean, the ammunition tubs had been emptied, and the oxygen canisters for the white-suits were gone. A row of gold key-hooks lined the wall and most of the keys were still hung in their place, surprisingly.

  He quickly formulated an escape plan.

  Richard ran over and started snatching keys off the golden hooks, cramming the keys into his pockets. He turned and quietly searched the ammunition bins, desperate to find a weapon of some sort, but also trying to be quiet enough not to alert the horde outside the trailer.

  Suddenly, the armory door flung open and Yates rushed into the room, coughing violently.

  Richard startled and spun towards him.

  Yates grabbed Richard and pinned him against the wall, hard.

  Richard struggled.

  Yates pressed his forearm against Richard’s throat, choking him.

  Richard stopped struggling and gasped for air, clawing at Yate’s arm.

  “Who… are you?” Yates wheezed, soaked with sweat.

  “Pl-please” Richard croaked.

  “I asked you a question.” He pressed his forearm harder into Richard’s throat, hacking up thick wads of mucus. “Who are you?” He moved his arm off of Richard’s throat a little so that the man could speak. “Did they send you here to kill me? Tie up all of their loose ends?”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about… I’m not sick,” Richard whispered. “I’m not sick yet.”

  Yates’ pallid expression brightened.

  “You’re the one Mathis was bringing me, aren’t you?” He looked uneasy and started coughing steadily. “Where is Mathis? Did he come here with you? I know he killed the team I sent to Crabtree.”

  “We crashed. Mathis is dead,” Richard said flatly.

  “It serves him right. His incompetent team that brought this pestilence on us, you know.”

  Yates kept his sweaty face an inch away from Richard’s, glaring into his eyes, coughing rattling chains and spraying his face with droplets.

  “I was going to take you away from here and whisk you off to safety. You’re a very valuable man,” Yates stammered between coughs. “They can use your blood to create a cure, as I’m sure you’ve been told. Your blood is special and Washington wants you badly, well, what’s left of Washington anyway.” He slid his free hand into his cargo pocket and pulled out a knife. “But, Washington doesn’t much care for me… They left me out here to die, you see. Can you believe that they didn’t even check on me when I stopped calling in my status reports on their goddamn space phone? I guess rank doesn’t equal shit now…”

  Yates broke off into another violent coughing spasm.

  Richard felt blindly for something to use to get the deranged man off of him… but his world was going dark, his airway cutoff.

  “Not that it matters now,” Yates continued. “I heard you on the phone in there… negotiating your way out… I was going to fly off into the sunset with you, my little bargaining chip, but my mask filter expired hours ago and now I have the bug. Why should I care if they create a cure long after I’m dead? Fuck them and fuck you.”

  Yates flipped open the tactical knife and brought the sharpened blade against Richard’s throat.

  “Well, I guess the world needs a good purging. Lord knows we’re overdue,” Yates muttered.

  Andy bashed a fire extinguisher against the side of Yates’ head, cracking open the man’s skull.

  Yates collapsed against the empty ammunition bins, his head wound gushing blood.

  Richard sunk against the wall with the fire extinguisher lying beside him.

  Andy turned and walked out through the armory’s breached rear door.

  “Andy, wait!” Richard cried as he ran out through the breached door and fell into the grass. He was sprawled on his back, body throbbing with pain.

  Most of the infected were still gathered at the front of the trailer, but a few had wandered around the back and were gathered near the breached armory exit. A soldier wearing the tattered remnants of a white-suit spotted Richard lying on the grass a few yards away and started to stagger towards him with an awkward gait.

  Richard quickly got on his feet and started to back-step away from the approaching soldier. He shoved both hands into his front pockets and pulled out two handfuls of vehicle keys he had snatched off of the wall in the armory.

  He ran towards the makeshift parking area, creating a wide buffer between him and the staggering soldier.

  Another solider missing his left arm and a civilian wearing an orange hunting vest spotted Richard as he ran and staggered after him.

  Richard ignored the growing crowd behind him and crawled over the toppled chain-link perimeter fence that surrounded the camp’s parking lot. He ran towards the nearest jeep and fumbled through the keys he had collected, dropping a number of them at his feet in the process.

  Nearby, more infected became aware of Richard’s presence and started to shamble their way towards the parking area, making guttural moans.

  Richard’s hands shook uncontrollably as he fumbled through the keys, unable to find the key that unlocked the jeep. He threw a panicked glance up towards the approaching horde as he tried multiple keys.

  The horde was nearing the edge of the parking lot and a few infected soldiers were already clamoring over the toppled chain-link fence.

  “Stop wasting time and move on to the next one!” Andy shouted from behind him.

  Andy’s voice startled Richard. He cursed under his breath and ran to the next jeep, dropping a few more keys as he ran.

  A sprinter shoved his way through the encroaching horde. His uniform was speckled with fresh blood and his mouth was matted with gore. He leapt over the shambled chain-link fence and darted across the parking lot towards Richard.

  Richard tried to open the second vehicle and, of course, it was locked. He began to shuffle throug
h the keys when he happened to notice the rapidity approaching soldier’s reflection in the window.

  The soldier let out a shrill scream and leapt at Richard-

  Richard quickly barreled out of the way, dropping all of the keys to the ground in the process.

  The soldier crashed into the door and shattered out the window. He quickly recollected himself and turned towards Richard, unmindful of the glass shards that were now embedded in his lacerated face.

  Richard almost took off running, but stopped to pick up some of the sets of keys he dropped. He picked up about four sets and reached to grab a fifth set when the soldier leapt onto his back.

  Richard threw the soldier off of him and sent the man sprawling backwards onto the pavement.

  The soldier’s right shoulder made an audible pop when he struck the ground. He let out a feral cry and crawled towards Richard.

  Richard quickly reached for the last key ring.

  The soldier reached out with his good hand, snatched up the key ring, and tossed it aside. He stared up at Richard with the slightest glimmer of intelligence behind his dead gaze.

  Richard, stunned, stepped back holding the keys against his chest. He backed away from the soldier, not fully comprehending what he had just witnessed.

  The soldier gave a feral cry and grabbed Richard’s ankle.

  A buck with a full rack of antlers charged into the parking lot, running towards Richard, twitching its head side-to-side violently.

  Richard spotted the infected animal, pulled his foot free from the soldier’s grasp, and dove out of the way just as the animal rammed against the side of the jeep, denting the driver-side door.

  Richard landed hard on the pavement and the keys went scattering across the ground again.

  The buck’s neck was mangled. It kicked and thrashed around on the ground furiously in tight circles, beating against the infected soldier.

  Richard scurried away on his hands and knees and quickly got back on his feet.

  The shambling horde had fully surrounded the parking lot and sprinters were quickly shoving their way through the massive horde.

  Richard bent over and grabbed a few sets of keys, turned, and ran towards the next vehicle, a Humvee.

  An army nurse shambled out from behind one of the jeeps and grappled with Richard, snarling. She leaned in and snapped at his neck.

  Richard drove his knee into the center of her stomach, keeping hold of the keys against his chest.

  The nurse sprawled backwards onto the pavement.

  Richard turned and ran towards the Humvees. He tried the driver-side door.

  It was unlocked.

  Richard swung the door open, ecstatic, just as a group of sprinters were almost on him.

  Three infected soldiers with gasmasks slung around their necks were sitting in the backseat of the Humvee, moaning. They climbed over each other as they crawled into the front seat towards Richard.

  Richard slammed the door shut and ran towards one of the nearby armored personnel carriers, steadily dropping keys as he ran.

  Two sprinters had broken ahead of the horde and closed the distance quickly as their dim eyes kept focused on their prey.

  Richard tried the driver-door of the first APC.

  It was unlocked and the armored door swung open effortlessly.

  A soldier sat slouched over the steering wheel, suffocated by his own depleted oxygen canister and his refusal to take off his mask. A second soldier sat slouched backwards in the passenger seat, victim of a self-inflicted gunshot in the head. The pistol lay by the passenger’s feet on the floorboard.

  Richard pulled the driver’s corpse out of the APC and let it fall to the ground. He started to panic as he stepped over the corpse and climbed into the driver’s seat and threw the few keys he had managed to hold onto atop the center console.

  One of the sprinters reached the APC, grabbed Richard’s leg, and tried to pull him out.

  Richard dove down and grabbed the pistol off the passenger-side floorboard. He turned and fired.

  The reverberating sound of the blast in the APC’s enclosed space made Richard wince in pain and drowned out his hearing with sudden tinnitus.

  The sprinter’s head snapped to the left as the bullet punched through his cheek and exited out the base of his skull. His grip on Richard’s leg fell limp and he collapsed backwards onto the pavement.

  The second sprinter approached just as Richard slammed the APC door shut and dropped the pistol onto his lap.

  The sprinter crashed against the armored door and collapsed backward. He rebounded and scrambled back onto his feet. He started ramming the door repeatedly with his shoulder with a fevered intensity.

  Richard ignored the pounding and snatched the keys off of the center console. He fumbled with them as he frantically searched for the APC’s ignition key.

  Panic started to set in.

  Did he drop it outside or was it one of the keys that he left behind in the trailer? He knew that the odds were not in his favor.

  His expression fell flat as he stared at the ignition switch; the key was already inside, left there by the deceased driver.

  Richard turned the key in the ignition switch.

  The diesel engine rumbled to life and a row of bright halogen spotlights mounted on the ash-covered roof of the armored vehicle threw out a harsh white light.

  The infected swarmed the brightly-lit APC, drawn in like moths towards the flickering flame. Within seconds, the APC was surrounded. Infected rocked the vehicle side-to-side, trying to claw their way inside.

  As the APC swayed, the pistol slid from Richard’s lap and landed on the floorboard between his feet.

  Richard threw the gears into ‘D’ and floored the accelerator.

  The rear-wheels spun-out and splattered the infected gathered at the back of the vehicle with mud.

  Richard threw the gears into ‘R’ and floored the accelerator.

  The rear-wheels spun-out in the opposite direction and covered the infected gathered at the sides of the vehicle in a coat of mud.

  “Damnit!” Richard yelled as the rear wheels sunk deeper into the soft earth, unable to gain traction.

  Hundreds of infected continued to emerge from the forest and converge on the APC, moaning. Infected wildlife joined the gathering horde in greater and greater numbers.

  Richard remained undeterred and kept the accelerator pressed against the floorboard.

  “You’re doing it wrong,” Andy said from the backseat. His voice sounded cruel and broken.

  Outside, the horde thickened.

  “Help me then!” Richard shouted.

  “I’m trying to tell you how to do it but–”

  Andy’s voice changed to that of Richard’s sister, Stacy.

  “–you’re not listening. You never listened, big surprise!” Stacy said from the backseat.

  The sound of her voice cut through the center of his head like a scalpel and made him wince with pain. He reached up and clasped his hands over his ears.

  “Shut up! Just shut the fuck up you self-righteous bitch!” Richard screamed. “I want to talk to Andy!”

  Stacy tittered.

  “I’m sure you do. You’re crazy; you know that right?”

  Images flashed behind his closed eyes. His sister, Stacy, many years ago, laughing, stood in the kitchen, yelling at him.

  “They never should have released you after the first time!”

  His sister, Stacy, lay face down in a pool of blood as he stabbed the knife into her chest repeatedly.

  “Mom would still be alive.”

  The kitchen door opened. His mother stepped back and dropped the bag of groceries she was holding. The bottle of milk shattered. She screams.

  “Dad would still be alive.”

  His father ran into the kitchen, holding the car keys in one hand and a bag of groceries in the other. The keys fell to the floor and landed in a puddle of milk.

  “You’re a sick freak. They would have known, if the
y would have paid attention that first time. I remember the first time, your first time...”

  A mangled cat lay dead in the backyard, beaten into an unrecognizable pulp by a rock. The general consensus was that the neighborhood kids did it, but he kept the collar in his closet as a trophy. Stacy found the collar. She was nosy. She was always so damned nosy.

  “Our brother would–”

  “Stop it!” Richard screamed.

  “You’re a cancer to society, isn’t that what the judge said? I wasn’t there, thanks to you, so my memory is a little foggy.”

  “Shut up!”

  “You should still be rotting in there,” Stacy said, smirking.

  ‘F Block’, cell 22. He had hated the guards in that block, but he liked looking at the nurses. The nurses were always nice to him.

  Richard pounded his fists against the side of his head, screaming, as he kicked his feet up underneath the dash repeatedly.

  “But, you know that, though, don’t you? You know that you belong in there! That’s why you can’t help but go back! Just look at you! How tragic!”

  “Stop it, you jabbering bitch!” Richard shouted.

  Stacy tittered, infuriating Richard.

  Richard screamed at the top of his lungs and bashed his head against the steering wheel. His forehead split open and blood dribbled down the bridge of his nose. He kept the accelerator pressed firmly against the floorboard and the tires spun uselessly in the mud.

  Richard closed his eyes tightly.

  “Go away!” he shouted.

  Stacy went silent and all that he heard were the infected gathered around the vehicle, moaning.

  Slowly, he opened his eyes.

  He felt a presence next to him and saw something in his peripheral vision.

  He looked over at the passenger seat, foot still mashed on the accelerator…

  The corpse of the soldier who committed suicide was gone.

  Stacy sat next to him, rotted skin hanging off of her face in clumps. Her body was ripe with gangrene and her dress was soaked with blood. Her abdomen was sliced open and her blackened innards lay in her lap.

  “You’re not immune! You’re going to burn for what you did to us!” she yelled, maggots falling out of her mouth.

  Richard immediately startled at the sight of her and jolted away from her corpse, hands still wrapped tightly around the steering wheel; the wheels of the APC jerked to the right.