Scarlet Memories (Book 1)

by Jessica T. Ozment

  ‘You don’t have to worry about them coming in this school. It’s fortified and look…. We already have our furniture in front of the door. It’s bullet proof glass.’ Jeremy sounded off, proud of himself. Ian thought he felt a change had happened in Jeremy. He wasn’t his normal self. He was being much more assertive.

  ‘Alright.’ Ian said.

  He put a hand to his face and felt the oil and dust that had built up. He smeared it onto his finger and took a look. It was chalky black.

  ‘Ok, the bathrooms are up stairs. I’m not opening the locker-room showers until we have made sure of our water situation.’

  ‘Ok.’ Ian said.

  He marched towards the staircase. He moved around the onlookers of the scene. Most of them moved out of the way for him. But, the rest were shocked at the site of Ian’s group. He gave one last look to the double glass front doors and headed up the stairs.

  Sam walked over to Jeremy and held her hand out.

  ‘Hi I’m Sam. You must be Ian’s friend?’ She asked clutching his hand lightly and shaking it. Jeremy smiled at her, welcoming her hand shake. He looked her over without being noticed. She was a good looking girl. She also seemed sweet. And that was a good combination in his book.

  ‘Nice to meet you. We are glad to have you.’ Jeremy told her through a rather toothy smile.

  ‘Missy upstairs,’ He pointed up at the second level.

  ‘She can set you up with some wash rags to clean your self up.’ Jeremy said it loud enough for the other half of Ian’s group to hear. They began to head up the stairs after Ian. They wanted to wash off the days events. It wasn’t something that they wanted to remember. And cleaning up would atleast make them feel better.

  Sam smiled back at him and nodded her head. She was very greatful for his kindness. He was allowing her to stay in this place. Regardless of who she was. She wouldn’t be alive if it wasn’t for Ian. She couldn’t be luckier in finding the two of them. Her eyes left his gaze and wandered to the staircase.

  ‘Thanks again for the help.’ She said reaching her eyes across the room. Sam wanted them all to know she was speaking to them. She would make sure to offer her help where ever it was needed here. Upstairs she was shown where to go to freshen up. She walked to the restroom door and gently pressed onto it with her body. Inside was warm. The lights were out. But, the crew had placed a few candles they had gotten from the various classrooms in between the stalls and on the sink for lighting. There was enough light for Sam to read the graffiti that some of the kids from the school had written inside the stalls. Some of the quotes were extremely rotten. Which made Sam try to remember if this was an elementary school or intermediate. She couldn’t believe this would be the work of anything less than an intermediate school. If she was wrong, Sam thought. That would mean kids were learning things they shouldn’t too quick and too young. She found a bucket that had fresh water in it. Sam assumed that Missy, the girl upstairs who had been helping everyone with provisions, had placed the bucket of water here for her. Sam dipped her rag into the bucket of water and wrung it out. But, she left enough water in the rag to clean herself thouroughly. She wanted to get Mrs. Shapiro’s scent off of herself. The smell of the infectious odor coming from her body was still in Sam’s nostrils.

  Ian came back down stairs from the bathrooms. He did feel better, regardless of what he thought earlier. He saw Jeremy waiting down by the men guarding the front doors. Ian walked over to them and greeted them with a smile and a wave. Jeremy looked up at him and waved back at him.

  ‘You feel better?’ Jeremy asked Ian. He could see that Ian was much more alert and less pale. He knew he just needed a moment to himself to wash up and ponder on what he had been through today. Jeremy went through the same thing once he finally got a free moment earlier.

  Ian nodded at him. ‘Yeah, I do. I really needed that. It was a hard day.’

  Ian found a nearby chair and sat down. He watched as Jeremy followed him.

  ‘You know, we could go to my office and talk.’ Jeremy told him.

  He grabbed Ian’s shoulder and squeezed it.

  ‘It’ll give us a chance to talk about what you found out with the undead. And you can meet Jerry. The pyrotechnics guy. He is going to help keep the watchmen rotating. They are going to set up traps once those things clear out.’ Jeremy told him.

  Ian followed Jeremy up the stairs to where the classrooms were. He noticed there were a lot of people who were going back to bed for the night. That probably wasn’t a bad idea. He would like to get to sleeping too. He needed a breather. Finally, they made it to the office door. He noticed that it belonged to the Principal of the school. How conveinent for Jeremy that he chose this room.

  ‘Have a seat.’ Jeremy said, motioning to the chair in front of his desk.

  It was a nice leather bound chair. It had a beautiful red oak finish. It also had incredible wrapped wooden arms to rest on. As Ian sat down in it he realized how comfortable that it was. His thought process led him to think about all of the students who had sat in the same chair before him. How they must have hated facing their Principal in the eye. He remembered having his own experiences in High School. He had a few brushes with the office administration. But, nothing too major. He did pretty well for himself in school. He just had problems with making it to school and on time.

  ‘So, we got the school!’ Jeremy said smiling brightly.

  He was extremely cheery given the fact that they lost a friend only moments before.

  ‘Yeah, I couldn’t be happier. Just trying not to think right now. I’ve seen a lot for one day. And I’m not too sure I want to talk about it.’ Ian shook his head lightly.

  He wanted all of the thoughts about dead corpses and mangled bodies, to disappear. But, no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t get the faces of his departed friends to leave his mind.

  Ian snapped back to the conversation. If anything could describe what he was feeling it be as though he felt like a soldier that just came back from a long war. He was trying to get his mind and body to adjust and ease down. His nerves were in bad shape. And he was pretty sure from an outsiders point of view he probably looked insane.

  ‘Hey you’ve seen a lot more than I have. I feel for you bro. Take it easy. I just wanted to let you know that I want you to be my right hand man here.’

  Jeremy sat back into his chair and crossed his hand and fingers together.

  ‘I think we have a good thing going here. If we ever get rescued… I think that is a good while away. This seems serious…’ Jeremy wiped his mouth..

  ‘I agree. I think there is a lot that can come out of this place. I think we need to think about extra fortification though.’ Ian told Jeremy. He paused and began speaking again.

  ‘While we were out there I saw how fast they can turn. Apparently, there are ways to turn slower. We need to find out how they turn. I noticed that some of them seem stronger and faster.’

  Ian got up from his chair and walked over to the office window. He peered out through squinting eyes. He could barely make out anything more than blurry moving shapes. It was still quite dark outside. And the light from inside the school was barely enough to illuminate the school yard.

  ‘We should watch what they do.’ Ian pointed outside down to the undead.

  ‘It’s better that we know our enemy, rather than sit blindly aside. I don’t want anymore accidents happening. We can’t let anyone else die.’ With that Ian settled back into his chair.

  ‘I agree with you Ian. I think we should start rationing food and water. That should be another main priority. ‘

  ‘Of course! Tomorrow, we can round everything up and I’ll make an inventory list. For now, I think I might hit the sac.’ Ian said slapping his wrist onto his knee gently.

  ‘Yeah, you do that. I think you’ve earned a good night’s rest.’ Jeremy smiled and reached a hand out to Ian.

  ‘You did good man. Gave these people hope about their loved ones.’

  ‘Thank
s…I just couldn’t let the kid die out there. I think we owed Susan that much.’ Ian said, glancing downwards..

  ‘You have made this bunch happy too.’ Ian told Jeremy grabbing his hand and shaking it back.

  They both smiled at eachother. Eventually, the two let go of their handshake. Ian nodded at Jeremy and then exited the room. He had a lot on his mind tonight. Not only about the flesh eating undead downstairs. But, also his thoughts turned to worrying about the group. Who would lead them? Will they be safe here? Can they safely scout for supplies without losing anymore people in the group? These questions weighed in heavily on Ian’s heart. He knew that he would do whatever was humanly possible to insure the survival of his group. But, at what cost?

  Roland Graves turned the steering wheel of his old red F150. It took a little more strength now to make a turn in this truck. The power steering had begun to go out. So, every 500 miles, Roland would refill his power steering box. It was a pain. But, he had been through a lot with this truck and he wanted to keep it as long as it would run. Roland was on his way to the county school. He worked there during the summer as a janitor. He kept the place clean so that when school finally started at the end of summer, it would be ready to begin. He also did maintenance for the school as well. He was told that there had been a break in at the back of the school in the FFA building. A lot of farming equipment was back there. Luckily, the cops had checked the inventory and nothing had been taken. Which was the weird part of it all. What’s worse, some of the schools farmland animals had been mauled to death. It was Rolands job to take care of the animals. Most of them like the horses could be fed every few days. So, this happened on one of the days he had off.

  He wasn’t looking forward to the clean up. The school had decided against hiring a clean up crew. But, luckily, the bodies of the horses that had been attacked were disposed of before Roland had made it to the school. He was especially happy about that. He had gotten pretty close to the animals and didn’t want to see them in that condition. It was bad enough that he had to clean up the blood stains. Apparently, whatever attacked them had torn them apart….Literally. What could do that? Roland wondered. He pulled up to the back of the school. There was a short road that led to the FFA building. He took it and shortly arrived at the front of it.

  From what Roland could see, there was no damage to the building. He came to a stop and parked off to the side. He had to open the gate in order to get back to the stables. Of course the padlock had been cut. He was already prepaired for that. Roland had a replacement in his pocket already. He released the latch and opened the gate wide enough to step through. He would just leave his truck where it was. No need in taking extra steps.

  The stables had a different smell about them today. The hint of blood ran rampant through several of the stalls. Roland associated the smell to when he had surgery on his arm. He cut it open on a rusty nail. He could remember the overwhelming smell that came from his blood soaked shirt. It was revolting. That smell mixed with horse menuer was a volitile concoction. Roland promptly walked over to the supplies closet inside the stables and pulled out a large red rag. It was big enough for Roland to wrap around his head and nose. It would help with the smell. But, wouldn’t completely block it. So, he would have to grin and bare it.

  Roland found the large shovel like tool that would help him pull up some of the blood pools left by the murdered horses. It should be an easy job since the floor was only hard dirt. He figured he would have to scoop out the affected areas in order to get the smell out. Roland walked up to the first stall. The horse that resided in this stall was still alive. He only kept them in the stalls over the weekends. The reason for that was because the town had a bunch of teenagers who liked to pull pranks. A few months ago, they broke in and released all of the horses from the large fence casing he had built for them to roam. It was probably about 2 acres wide and 3 acres long. Big enough for the horses to have no trouble stretching their legs.

  Roland finally finished scrapping out the stalls. It took him a little bit more time than he had imagined. He had to take several breaks to throw up in the back. Roland almost couldn’t finsih. Once he was finished he decided he would go check on the horses. It was Friday after all and he would need to get them back inside for the weekend. He stepped out of the stables and headed for the horses. It didn’t take him long to find them. They had been grazing close to the front entrance.

  Roland opened up the gate and walked into the enclosing. From what he could see a few of the horses were missing. Jasper, Trot and Dixie were all gone. It wasn’t like them to wander away form the others like this. Roland placed a hand to his temple. He couldn’t understand why anyone would harm their horses. It was just cruel what they were doing. Couldn’t they leave well enough alone…

  Roland spotted one of the missing horses in the field. It was laying down sleeping. Maybe they had strayed away form the others on purpose. Roland thought. Although, he wasn’t entirely sure why they would change character now. It wasn’t like them. Roland rushed to Dixie’s side. She was facing away from him, so he couldn’t see her condition yet. As he rounded her body, Roland noticed a man laying on top of her torso. Roland wondered what he was doing.

  ‘Hey!’ He yelled. Roland stomped over to him and spat,’ What do you think you are doing?’

  The man didn’t budge. From what Roland could tell he was chewing on something.

  ‘Are you listening to me?’ Roland cried.

  His temper had begun to shine through. The man still did not waiver.

  ‘I’m warning you mister!’ Roland looked down and saw that he still had the shovel in his hand. He had forgotten that he still held it. The man continued to eat. Roland thought it was weird that he didn’t even flinch an inch when Roland spoke to him. It’s as if he were a hungry dog. Feed him and he won’t stop eating until his food is gone. That kind of dog will not lose interest in his food.

  Roland had had enough. Just what this man was doing, he was unsure of. It was time to deal with this. Roland raised the shovel and brought it down hard onto the top of the man’s skull. He heard a deafening crack and the man went down. He fell off of the horse and smacked down onto the ground. As he fell, Roland saw what the man had been chewing on. It was Dixies intestines…

  What…NO WHY?! Roland screamed. He threw his hands up above his head. As his arms fell back down, he brushed Dixie’s mane. It was a shame that she was gone. She was a beautiful horse. He couldn’t be more upset right now. Just what was this man up to. He pulled out his cell phone to call the authorities and then his boss. Roland looked over at what was left of Dixie. There wasn’t much left of her. The man had devoured a great deal of her insides. He looked over at the man and noticed that his stomach was bulging imensely. This allowed Roland to see that he wasn’t breathing. How hard had he hit him? He decided he would check the mans pulse. He bent down and picked the man’s hand up and pressed his index and forefinger to his wrist. His assumption was right. There was definitely no pulse. He couldn’t believe what was happening.

  Roland threw the man’s hand down quickly. He didn’t want to touch a dead man. What had he done. He shouldn’t have hit him so hard. What was he thinking. A thousand questions popped up into his mind. Roland’s head was spinning. What was he going to do now? Would anyone believe that this man was eating his horse Dixie? It didn’t seem like a true story. It sounded completely farfetched. But, yet it was true.

  He knew he had to call the cops now. He dialed the numbers 911 with shakey hands and fingers. His knees were getting weak as well. He kept on stumbeling in his mind over what he would say to dispatch. Eventually, he calmed down and realized that he had nothing to worry about. It wasn’t as if he would be lieing about anything.

  Roland had a past with the law. He had been to prison for assault. That was why he was only able to work summer’s here. The children wouldn’t be at school. It was a condition upon hiring him because of his past. Roland wasn’t proud of his past. He knew he was a diffe
rent person now. He had picked the pieces up and put himself back together. And he’d like it to stay that way. He didn’t want anymore trouble with the law. He could’nt go back to jail. He just couldn’t.

  The phone rang and rang. No one was answering on the other line. It was odd. Someone always answered. What could be going on. Today was just getting weirder and weirder. Roland ended the call and stepped back. All that he wanted was to wash his hands of this. He didn’t want anything to do with it. Roland decided he would call his boss and tell him the strange news. He hoped that he would understand the situation. He could not risk losing this job. He had to keep it at all cost. Roland made a fair wage here and he couldn’t screw that up.

  He hit the button send on his bosses contact profile. The symbol for the call to start raced across the screen of his cell and he placed it to his ear. At that moment, Roland heard a blood-curddeling cry come from behind him. Roland swiftly turned around and saw a giant group of people coming towards him. Roland began to step backwards towards the front gate of the fence. Why were they coming at him like that? Something caught Roland’s attention out of the corner of his left eye. Something was moving towards him quickly. It was the man who had eaten Dixie.

  ‘But, your dead!’ Cried Roland. His voice was cracking. He could not believe his eyes. He thought he had seen bazzar tonight already. But, this…Roland wasn’t sure what he thought. Roland held out the shovel at the man.

  ‘Don’t come any closer…Or I’ll defend myself! I swear it!’ Roland yelled. But, the man wouldn’t stop coming at him. It was the same deal as before. It was no use talking to him. Roland swung the shovel at the man just as he was a couple of feet away from him. The shovel landed right in the middle of the guys head. The blow seemed to stun the man but, he was still getting back up.

  ‘What are you?’ Roland asked. He knew he had to do something quick. That large group of people was heading right for them. And he didn’t want to be around to find out what they were doing or why they were even here. He wanted to get out. Roland took the shovel and raised it high above his head. He came down hard with the sharp edge landing between the mans shoulders and neck. His head toppled to the ground and rolled a few feet away from him. His body stayed sitting upright, suspended in the air as if he were still alive. Finally, after several seconds it crumpled to the ground. Roland knew he had no time to spare. He needed to run.