Father Martín left the wake room and made a left turn into the wider hallway. Though this hall was crowded, with everyone looking at him with accusing eyes. However, Father Martín’s smirk did not disappear from his face. On the contrary, his eyes began to brighten. As he passed by, the people watching him began to grimace, with sneezes and strange odours. The air suddenly went foul, there was a fetid, rotten smell.
He crossed the wide hall before the stunned gazes of everyone in attendance, and one again turned and left the hall. His Bible was still firmly clutched in his left hand, and in his right hand, he has the syringe still placed between his fingers, which was filled with a lilac violet substance.
He opened the door to the room that led to the deceased, who was lying in his coffin. His smile was now wilder, behind the glass, before the attentive eyes of the deceased’s relatives.
Then, he raised his hand and showed off the syringe, which had a strange substance dribbling from the end of the needle.
‘Now to give him life,’ he whispered, injecting the contents of the syringe into the blueish neck of the deceased. The deceased’s relatives, on the other side of the glass, shook their hands and shouted a range of expletives that Father Martín could not hear.
Father Guillermo held his arms crossed with a stupid smile stretched across his bruised face. Father Isidoro stood at the other end of the room, behind the mourning relatives, with a serious countenance.
Then, the deceased began to move from under the funerary shroud, before the stunned eyes of all, who had suddenly fell silent. The deceased had opened its eyes, which were now an opaque white and darting back and forth. The coffin was almost vertical. The deceased pulled his arms from out of the funerary shroud and showed off his hands with twisted fingers, forming strange shapes that would be difficult to imitate. He rose and left the coffin, with his now screaming relatives running away, with looks of terror in their faces.
The other crowd of people from the other two rooms peered out into the hallway, murmuring unintelligible things in the midst of the chaos and delirium.
‘I told you,’ Father Martín said, opening his arms and showing off a wide smile with an unusual glow in his eyes. They were like two shining lanterns lit behind an opaque glass.
Though, no one listened to him.
Though, his plan had only just begun. He was to distribute the serum of life, which the nurses at the Northern Health Centre were currently doing.
At this point, it was already midday, and the sun was in the direct centre of the sky, like a great ball of fire to witness this display of immortality and the laws of nature that it was currently breaking.
With that, Father Martín returned the other two deceased in the adjoining rooms to life, while their relatives also fled in terror.
LXXXV
Antonio came dangerously close to the drooling zombie, with its mouth wide open and hands spread out like claws. Santiago Contreras was almost in the same position. Antonio warned his brother that this was no longer a human, and now there were several other young men with long knives at the ready. Without thinking twice, Antonio bent down to pick up a brick that was next to the rubbish bin. To his right there was an empty space full of dry grass and a small, half-finished plaza that now had become a toilet to the seagulls.
‘Are you in there?’ Antonio’s voice sounded hoarsely, and he noticed that the young man’s eyes were now an opaque white with a sense of ire behind his face. A direct contrast to the smiling Santiago that he knew well.
Santiago Contreras did not answer back, there was only a snarl and a foam that erupted from his mouth. Much foam. The right side of his face was bloody and his mouth opened and closed, showing off his teeth. Somehow, the bloke couldn’t control his jaw, Antonio thought to himself, withdrawing from the zombie.
Santiago’s brother, nicknamed “Kickass”, had his back arched and his body bent with his hands outstretched. In his right hand, his blade gleamed in the sunlight, which he had picked up from the ground when Santiago was attacked. It was a knife much like his own, with a sharp, steel blade about four centimetres long.
‘Bro, what has happened to you?’ Kickass said. He had the habit of calling his brother “bro”, a custom rooted in the family. ‘This isn’t you, those eyes of yours!’
‘Bloody Hell, be careful!’ Antonio shouted, with the drooling zombie coming closer to Kickass.
The young man turned towards the drooling zombie and, once again, the edge of the blade entered its chest, which continued to bleed profusely. Though, the zombie kept moving.
‘What a sick ending for you,’ Kickass said, sweaty. He was wearing a black shirt from which his armpit and back sweat-stains could still be seen.
Several women surrounded the drooling zombie, and kicked it with all their might. Several of them in the balls, but the zombie, with its deep and innocuous gaze, only continued to growl and stretch out its elongated arms.
Antonio, with the brick in hand, approached the drooling zombie from the back and raised his thin but enervated arm.
A child with a face full of snot hung from the side of one of the women, screaming like a little goat.
The noise as the brick crashed against the zombie’s skull was similar to the sound of a nut cracking. From the fracture came blood, then a whitish and greyish liquid like puss. The drooling man then seemed to lose his balance and finally fell to the ground.
‘Aim for the head! Aim for the head!’ Antonio shouted to Kickass. Though, it was clearly his brother.
‘Bro, what’s going on, bro?’
Santiago Contreras approached the edge of the knife and pushed himself against it with the weight of his body. The metal blade easily penetrated Santiago’s stomach, and with that, same a stream of blood that stained the pavement. At that moment, Kickass saw what he swore was a soft smile on Santiago’s lips, as if recovering a piece of his sanity again. Even so, this was still painful for him.
‘Oh!’ One of the women exclaimed, tugging the hair from her head, pulling out a bit.
‘He has stabbed his brother!’
‘This is no longer his brother! Antonio announced, still with the brick in his hand that now had a chip in it due to the brutal blow against the drooling zombie’s head. The zombie now laid on the ground, inert, in a puddle of blood mixed with grey puss.
Though these words were carried away by the wind, and Santiago launched himself towards Kickass, biting his hand. Kickass cried out and could be heard by the women. They also began to scream upon seeing the blood coming from his hand. He was scared and dizzy, but within seconds, his vision began to blur and he felt his eyeballs beginning to shiver with fury under his eyelids.
Several men, with knives in hand, looked at each other, with a grimace that stretched across their faces. They were shocked. They saw Kickass on the ground, seizing right in front of them and a hundred more eyes, foaming at the mouth, his fingers forming what looked like a claw. He began to look at the others with indifference.
His zombification was quick, and moments later he was up and shambling.
Antonio returned to his father and Kickass’s father.
‘What has happened, Antonio?’ Juan asked, his eyes bright with tears that were about to erupt.
‘What needed to happen, Juan…’
With that, all three of them fell into silence, while everything else continued its course.
LXXXVI
Not far from there was the Northern Health Centre, about three hundred metres away from the action that had just taken place, where, from the windows, the chaos could be seen that lined the centre. This district, known as the Majadas district, was mainly populated by villas and duplexes. It was now about midday, and there were already people forming a line to enter the medical centre, looking out their windows and doors to check for zombies passing through between the streets.
The ambient noise confused the zombies.
‘Shit! There is no room in the car par
k today!’ A bald man with excited eyes complained, circling the car park that was completely packed with cars.
‘What has happened today?’ The woman that he was driving with asked, leaning back in her seat.
‘Everyone is always ill at the weekend!’ The man croaked. He had dark, plastic sunglasses placed on his forehead that stuck there as if they were glued, advancing at about 16 kilometres / hour.
‘That’s right, today is the carnival!’ The brown-haired woman responded.
‘Any longer?’ her mother-in-law from the back seat asked. The women, a widow for three years now, suffered from severe abdominal pains and had diarrhoea.
The man noticed that there were also many people from the surrounding neighbourhood right there at the entrance of the medical centre. Something was not right. Some of them were walking strangely.
‘I’ll stop for a moment in the drive and I’ll let you both off while I look for a spot,’ the man explained, speeding up a little bit more.
‘Very well,’ his wife responded, with a thin line drawn across her face.
The man entered the ambulance area, right near the front door, dodging people like he had never done before, and stalled. The brake lights went on dimly in the sunlight and a zombie seemed to take notice of the lights. At least, that is how it seemed.
The window on the driver’s side was lowered and the man’s elbow peeped over the edge. Suddenly, he felt a deep pain that caused a deafening scream inside the car’s cabin.
‘What’s wrong?!’ The wife cried out, her eyes wide with confusion.
‘That bloody bastard has bitten me!’ He exclaimed, showing her the teeth marks on his elbow. Her look became more intense and confused.
A zombie lay on top of the hood of the car, showing its mouth full of bloody teeth. The mother-in-law who was sitting in the back suddenly released her bowels. The women looked back to say something, but then noticed how her husband’s gaze had started to change completely.
LXXXVII
The three recently deceased of the mortuary walked out into the midday streets, stumbling and emitting guttural sounds from their throats. Their opaque white eyes had an air of ire and fury to them, walking in front of Father Martín, Father Guillermo, and Father Isidoro. Now, however, they were joined by two acolytes of the mortuary chapel, Daniel and David, both with a drastic change in their visages.
The mourners had fled the mortuary in terror, with not a single car in the car park left. There were skid marks everywhere, indicating a hasty escape. Everyone, absolutely everyone, had disappeared.
Father Martín had a plan, and was now on his way to the local cemetery. Both the old and the new cemetery. He would break open their coffins and inject them with the serum of life. His reign was about to begin, and only he knew the results. It was to give life, after all.
The five then went down the narrow Blasco Ibáñez Street, which led directly to the cemetery. There, they would meet up with five of the nurse carriers, who, at the moment, were still at the Northern Health Centre, which itself was very close to the cemetery. Perpendicular to Blasco Ibáñez Street was De La Democracia Avenue, which was where they would meet.
‘Now to give them life,’ Father Martín said, climbing the slope, while the others remained silent. Their faces said what their mouths couldn’t.
LXXXVIII
‘Sebastián, what are you doing here?’ Diego asked, recognising him even though they had not seen each other for several years, neither passing by at Juan Carlos Avenue nor seeing him drink a glass of Vichy water at a table in the Spanish Plaza.
‘Diego!’ The older man exclaimed, who had now reached ninety-five years, probably at least a hundred. His voice was as soft as a whisper. He looked visibly tired.
‘And who may I ask is this?’ Javier croaked, his fingers caressing the barrel of the rifle that he had to his side, leaning against the ground.
‘This man is the one who knows the depths and secrets of this castle,’ Diego explained, smiling at him before adding, ‘We truly owe him one.’
‘Bah!’ Javier shouted, looking down the passageway.
Sebastián was sitting in one of the vaults, which was more spacious than the others, with a wooden table that was beginning to feel damp. On it there were many papers and scrolls; something that aroused Álvaro’s curiosity.
‘So, have you seen them yet?’ Sebastián asked, looking at them with a white eye. He had lost it several years ago in an accident, and now it looked like a patch plastered with bandages.
Diego was surprised, and suddenly the temperature of his body descended until he felt chills, followed by a strong heat that began in his stomach and let up to his oesophagus. He wondered if Sebastián meant what he thought that he meant.
His voice trembled.
‘You mean, those things?’
Sebastián nodded.
Diego now had a huge frog in his throat and could barely breathe. His face had now turned completely red.
‘Where have you been these past few years?’ Diego asked, diverting the conversation.
‘In the shelter, you know, the one built back during the civil war. Every week I go to the supermarket and buy supplies from the DIA, next to the Parra Pass, so that no one could see me,’ Sebastián explained in a soft voice that was not broken, but rather tired, before adding, ‘I have been preparing for this moment for a long time. For those things, out there.’
There was a moment of silence that seemed both eternal yet guilty. At least, in a serious voice, Juan intervened, filling the hollow spaces of the corridor and the room.
‘So, you already know of those men who get up after dying?’ Juan asked.
‘Yes.’
‘And what are they?’ Juan insisted, now beginning to stroke his beard.
‘They are the walking dead. Walkers. Zombies. There are two types of zombies: rational and irrational zombies. Rational zombies lead and irrational ones follow.’
To Javier, this was all Greek to him, and his eyebrows rose.
There was another short yet ominous pause.
‘Is that why the priest was giving sermons while the others only growled and shambled, as if they were blind?
‘A priest?’ Sebastián’s astonishment was such that his facewent two tones paler than before, even more than Juan.
‘Yes, did you not see or hear him?’ Juan asked, approaching Diego’s side, just in front of Sebastián who was sitting on a wooden stool. Behind him there was an open hole in the wall, but it only led to the smell of salt water and algae.
‘Then it must have been him,’ Sebastián replied, with his fist closed and several whitish wrinkles showing around the fingers.
‘I’m afraid that I don’t understand,’ Juan said, lowering his head with his neck bent by the low ceiling.
Then Sebastián moved his right hand, releasing his fist, signalling to the scrolls laid out on the wooden table.
LXXXIX
It was now two o’clock in the afternoon and the pensioners were still on their terraces sunbathing, talking excitedly about the carnival, and still without knowing each other’s names. They were John and Peter, but by this point, that didn’t matter. They had lived in the Geraneos bungalows for about two weeks now, retired, and to them, it was more important to discuss the tranquillity of Águilas.
They obviously didn’t know what to expect, as it was not time yet.
XC
‘What seems to be the problem, madam?’ The glazed-eyed nurse asked.
‘I seem to have some sort of fever,’ the widow replied back, who was still mourning.
‘It could be an infection, madam. I’m going to have to give you a dose of antibiotic,’ the nurse explained, lifting up a syringe with the lilac violet liquid inside.
The elderly woman opened her eyes wider when she saw the syringe.
‘May I please inject it myself?’ The widow asked.
The nurse gave her a wide smile, which w
as when the widow saw the ugly wounds on the nurse’s infected face.
‘Are you okay?’
The nurse touched the wounds on her face with her other hand and forced another smile out.
‘These wounds were caused by a schizophrenic patient that he had,’ the nurse replied. The widow seemed to believe it.
The woman rolled up the sleeve of her blouse to receive the injection in her shoulder.
‘No madam, not there. I’m not going to prick you there,’ the nurse’s voice sounded like a cascade with a sharp bottom. The syringe landed directly in the woman’s neck, and she screamed at the heat of the needle in her jugular.
‘I thought that the needle went…’ and with that, here eyes changed colour, and her face began to contort and her features became different. ‘Tell me what I need to do,’ this new person asked, with a different voice than the widow’s.
‘You must go out and give life to others,’ the nurse said, hiding the syringe. ‘A scratch will be more than sufficient.
And with that, the widow came to life. It was a different life than her previous one. Nothing hurt her, and she, apparently, remained the same. Except, she did have a strange inner feeling of wanting to live beyond death. But there she was, and now she was a follower.
The nurse rose to her feet and went to the next patient in the midst of the chaos of people drooling and biting each other. Meanwhile, there were servents among them. Those who received the serum of life when they were normal. They were different, they could think and act, plus the irrepressible desire to follow. Though, for the moment, they did not know who they were following, but they would very soon. Father Guillermo, Father Isidoro, and the two acolytes from the mortuary, Daniel and David also knew. The nurses as well.
And the infection spread to all of those approaching the Norther Health Centre.
They were divided.
XCI
Sebastián armed himself with courage and began to explain to the others what this was all about. Who were they? And what caused such a transformation?
Infected, Zombi The City of the Zol Page 15