Zombpocalypse (Book 1): Contingency

by Mariah Lynde

  I was naked.

  Completely, totally, one hundred and ten percent not covered by a single stitch of clothing and left with only a sheet. A sheet, I might add that had already started to droop low in the threat of falling off.

  What…the…actual…fuck?

  Apparently, my latest encounter with the undead had in some way damaged my internal monologue. What I had thought had been a mental exclamation on my state of being had actually been bellowed aloud. Those murmured voices a little ways off suddenly stopped as I heard the sound of footsteps coming towards me.

  Frantic, confused, and still somewhat shaky on the details of how I had gotten into my current state, I completely forgot about all that had happened earlier in the day. Instead I moved to grab the object nearest to me while keeping my eye on the bedroom door. Thanks to the darkness and shadows in the room, the only thing I saw darkening my doorway was a single silhouette that blocked out the light from the rest of the apartment.

  While I would love to tell you that what took place next was a dignified and thorough defense of my person, it would be a complete lie. The second that hulking frame filled my doorway I screamed like a banshee on ear shattering levels. My skull pounded, my ears popped, and my arm was flailing to send any object I could grab sailing in the direction of the door. All of the things around and on my bed were fair game as weapons. Pillows, change, afghan, alarm clock, phone, lamp…at this point they were all useful enough to lob at the man standing in my doorway while I screamed at the top of my lungs.

  “You sick asshole! Get the hell out of my house! I’m going to call the cops! Fuck that…Stay the hell away from me…If you get one step closer I swear to god I’m gonna rip off your d-”

  My screaming rant was cut off by the weight of a large body flopping down on top of my own. Small I may have been, but the series of grunts that came as I elbowed, kneed, kicked and swung at my would be attacker made it obvious this bastard was going to have to kill me or die trying.

  “Ow! Stop…Damn… Ugh…” That last was cut off by sudden wheeze as my knee slammed up into the guy’s upper thigh. His body tensing as the pain registered, I had already moved to slam my forehead into his face. “FUCK…dammit…CALL HER OFF DUDE!”

  The glaring light of a phone display shone in my eyes and nearly blinded me. Blinking to clear my vision, I saw MY phone with Robbie’s picture and number displayed. What…

  “Sweetie… Sweetie…. Stop attacking the hot sounding man…” Robbie’s voice was barely audible above the grunts of the male lying over me and the rustle of the sheets as I moved. Wheezing a small breath I stared at the phone and then down at the head resting just on top of my chest and way closer to my sheet clad breasts than I was comfortable with. Still, my best friend’s voice continued, “I know you can hear me. It’s okay, darlin’. Just take a breath…”

  Dragging in a harsh breath, I slowly began to calm down. Hearing Robbie talking me down was kind of surreal, but it brought a levity to the situation that was greatly needed. My mind shifted out of panic mode and the events of the day began to slowly click into place. Not that it made much of a difference when I realized the hulking frame settled on top of me could be no one other than Cal Mitty. This man was quickly becoming the bane of my existence.

  “Get OFF!” Grunting, I pulled my legs up, both knees slamming into his gut to force him to roll off of me or risk a shot to the balls when I started to kick out and squirm. Fortunately for me, it seemed to work as I snatched my phone only to hear the almost infectious laughter on the other end of the line, “It’s not funny!”

  “Oh, Darlin’ you know it is.” Robbie snickered a bit before working to hide his amusement, ‘You okay?”

  “You mean other than waking up and finding myself naked in my bed with a man I barely know flying in to lay on top of me? I’m peachy.” I groused, moving to lift my free hand and securing the sheet around my torso.

  “Well, I had a hand in that. I told him to do it. When he told me what had happened, I figured the last thing you’d need was waking up covered in ick and gross.” That offhand comment had me seeing red. While I appreciated Robbie’s concern, the idea that he’d given someone permission to take off my clothes was irritating. Still, he had a point. If I’d come to and still been covered in brains, blood, and zombie parts I likely would have lost my mind again.

  “Ugh, point taken. Still doesn’t mean getting me out of stained clothes equals having to have me completely naked. Not cool, man.” Still unwilling to concede to Robbie fully, I grasped onto the whole detailed bit about being fully naked.

  “Actually, there kinda was a point to it. We don’t know how the infection spreads, darlin’. I gave him permission to clean you up and I stayed on the phone with him the entire time. I promise, there was no molestercating, I’d have killed him.” As always, he spoke with equal amounts of joviality and seriousness that soothed my already frayed nerves. Sometimes, it could be extremely unfair having someone who knows all the right moves to placate your anger. No matter what they did, you could never truly be upset with them for more than five minutes at a time.

  “Fine.” Sounding like a petulant child I rolled over to scoot towards the side of the bed. While I may have been forced to accept why I had found myself lying naked on my bed, it didn’t mean I had to like it.

  “Don’t you dare ‘Fine’ me. If things had been reversed you know you woulda told them to strip me down and make sure I wasn’t wounded, hurt, or otherwise covered in gross.” Again, that voice of reason coupled with his obvious amusement wore down my irritation over the whole matter. Robbie was right, if the situation had been reversed I’d have made sure that someone stripped his ass bare and cleaned him up. On the other side of that, I seriously doubted that Robbie would have passed out in the open over skewering a zombie. He’d wait till he got home and then completely lose his mind. So all in all, he still had one up on me.

  While I sat there rationalizing my way to acceptance, it dawned on me that Cal had handed me the phone with Robbie already on the line. Scowling as I turned my head to look over at him where he laid on the floor beside my bed, my eyes narrowed.

  “Wait, how much do you know?” I asked Robbie and proceeded to provide the man beside me with the best death glare I could conjure.

  “Enough to know you had a fairly busy day. Shooting people and apparently going all psycho crazy on zombie melons.” The way he said the last with a certain amount of restraint made it obvious that despite trying to make light of what had happened – Robbie was more than a little concerned. A suspicion confirmed when his voice dropped to a near whisper and he continued, “Talk to me, Goose. Are you okay?”

  “I didn’t shoot anybody! And what do you think?” I snapped, knowing full well he didn’t deserve my ire but also needing to vent. Such was our bond that even with my unplanned guest in the room I slid into the conversation with ease. Forgetting about the likes of Cal Mitty and Teena Hawthorne, I began my diatribe with a sudden vengeance, “I spent the morning rolling from store to store, watching clerks and cashiers act like the mindless drones they are. Seriously, how damn hard is it to run a register? As if that’s not enough, they all look so smug and I just wanted to slap them in the face and tell them to start preparing themselves. I swear to god, it’s like they’re willfully blind Robbie!”

  “Well, to be fair, darlin’…you’ve had the occasion to be in the right place at the right time the last couple of days…”

  “You think I wanted that? No.” I grumped out, “It just happened. Do you have any idea how frustrating it is that no one else around me seems to recognize the same things? It drives me crazy. Or more accurately, makes me feel like I’m crazy.”

  “Ah, Angel…you’re not crazy. A little unbalanced maybe, but I like you that way. So you wanna tell me how it is that Miss EMT extraordinaire passes out at the sight of some blood on a dead corpse?” Let it never be said that my best friend beat around the bush. If anything he attacked said bush with the equiva
lent of a major league swing and a bat the size of a small country.

  “I’m fine-ish.” Shrugging, I began the expected run down of events as my feet touched the floor so I could push myself out of the bed. Moving towards the closet I tucked the phone in on my shoulder and continued, “Honestly. I just had a momentary breakdown. It’s not exactly like using a tire iron to break the skull of a former human being is something I practice daily. It’s a lot to take in, Robbie.”

  “And?” He asked, knowing full well that there had to be more to it. Not that he was wrong, but the subject didn’t happen to be one I wanted to dwell on.

  “It all kind of hit me. You know the whole, zombies beginning of the end stuff. I mean, it’s kill or be killed, but they used to be people. One day, it could be us. I keep seeing that chick from last night in the lobby. Tonight, this guy, I mean… you could tell he’d been dead for a bit. At least a day, but he was young Robbie. I don’t want to die like that. I don’t want to go out and become one of these things.” Murmuring softly as I went through all of the clothing in my closet to find something comfortable to wear.

  “Oh, sweetie…you won’t.” Robbie began and then sighed a little. “You can’t let the darker thoughts rule you. If you do, they’ll control you.”

  “I know, I know.” I sighed a bit and shook my head, “But we have to be realistic too. I mean, accept the things you cannot change and all that crap.”

  “Yes, you accept them, you acknowledge them as facts but you don’t harp on them.” As expected, when I couldn’t function, Robbie became my voice of reason, “I get it, sweetie. It’s a lot to take in, but you can’t focus on the possible what if’s and when. If you do, they are bound to come sooner rather than later. Like any crisis, you worry about this moment and the very next, not something that could happen months or years down the road.”

  “I know, I know. Just daunting to see is all.” Even as I answered I knew that the unevenness in my voice gave away my lack of confidence. While in some ways, Robbie was right, I knew that a big part of me had begun to doubt I would ever make it back home in the middle of this mess. Realistically, home was only about three hours away, but in the middle of an outright crisis? It might as well have been a whole continent.

  Few people ever really took the logistics of a whole situation into account. Unfortunately, I had been cursed to always think in patterns. Beginning of an apocalypse? I don’t just see point A, I take into account my plan during said crisis which would be to get home to my family and from there all of the small obstacles that could possibly become an issue. To some it was tedious, for me it was headache inducing. Anytime I thought I had considered each and every variable I thought of another.

  This got especially worse when I had more information to work on. More information meant more variables, more knowledge meant taking into account all the different players and situations on the board. All of that, well…it meant having to introduce new factors and variables at a constantly changing rate. In the last twenty-four hours I’d been thrown into a maelstrom of chaos that presented new challenges and represented just how rapidly things were likely to change in the coming weeks.

  “Daunting as it might be, seems to me you picked up a new recruit.” The amusement in Robbie’s voice was not something I could really ignore. While to others it seemed like a harmless joke, I knew him far too well for that. My best friend, for all his charm – happened to be a hopeless optimist...especially when it came to me.

  “Uh-uh. Don’t go there. No.” I frowned, dragging down one of my favorite t-shirt’s to throw on the bed.

  “Come on. He sounds hot. Is he hot?” Sighing at the almost wistful note in my best friend’s voice I shook my head. Hopeless.

  “Maybe a little, not like it matters. Not his type, besides…impending apocalypse of doom, remember.” Trying to be as vague as possible since I’d been so aptly reminded about my visitor, I struggled to change the subject away from Cal’s presence. “So how is it I ended up already on the phone with you when I happened to be dead to the world.”

  “Well, when you didn’t show up for the Skype call, I assumed the worst. So, I started texting. When you didn’t answer texts, I tried to call. When you didn’t pick up the house phone, I called your cell and the hot one picked up.” Robbie insisted on continuing his little campaign for my love life while all I wanted to focus on was not becoming a zombie snack.

  “Focus.” I snapped, shaking my head as I grabbed a set of shorts. “We have more important matters. How late am I for the Skype call?”

  “About forty-five minutes give or take. We’re willing to wait.” That almost gleeful note in his voice gave me pause.

  “Oh, hell. Have you been on the phone with me where they can hear it this whole time?” Groaning again, I didn’t even have to hear him answer to know the truth.

  “Well, only my end. How long you think you’ll be?” My best friend sounded entirely too pleased with himself, “We can wait for the time it would take for you to manage a quickie and a shower.”

  “NO!” I yelled into the phone. What I had intended to be a quietly forceful answer had suddenly brought me a lot more attention than I wanted. While I wasn’t exactly looking at him, I sensed Cal Mitty moving around behind me and rushed to lower my voice as I mumbled, “Give me ten minutes. I’ll shower and be online.”

  Robbie’s answering chuckle made me grimace. God, this day just kept going from bad to worse.

  “Ten minutes, then I’m calling back. Love you, sweetie.” Just like that the call disconnected and for about ten seconds I stared at the phone like it would give me the answers I wanted.

  Shit.

  Robbie meant every word he had just said. I had ten minutes before he would call again. Oh, I’m no idiot. I know he was hoping that he could get Cal on the phone instead of me. That particular idea had me shuddering in distaste. I could not…no, I would not let that happen. It would be an embarrassment of the highest order.

  Without a word to my ‘guest’ I grabbed my shorts and t-shirt then hauled ass for the bathroom. I had about five minutes if I was lucky, to try and scrape off whatever zombie parts remained on my person and get my ass downstairs to nerdvana in order to avoid a completely horrifying situation. Not that what I’d truly be facing was any better, but it would be a damn sight easier than my best friend trying to coax some guy I barely knew into a situation with me.

  God help me, we were in the middle of a crisis and I had to worry about my best friend playing matchmaker. Then again, at least it wasn’t my mother.

  Turning on the water in the shower, I squeaked when I jumped under the spray. My rush to get this over and done so I could be down on the computer for the Skype call with the others and try to mitigate damage had been costly. Cold water cascaded over my body and instantly chilled me to the bone. On the plus side, any lingering sleepiness that had been plaguing me faded away.

  Grabbing my shampoo, I let the cold water numb my skin while I hurriedly moved to scrub my hair. While my fingers were massaging over the back of my scalp I heard a faint knock on the door.

  “Ange…Miss Warren…are you alright in there?” Cal Mitty's voice carrying through my bathroom brought me to a standstill. It was strange hearing someone else’s voice in my house and more than that….having him speak to me while I was in the bathroom.

  “Um…Yeah, I’m fine. Why don’t you go ahead and wait for me in the kitchen, I’ll be right out.” While it may have been seen as rude, I couldn’t help but feel like his presence was crowding into my personal space. This whole situation had me off balance and uncomfortable. The last thing I had wanted in the middle of all this mess seemed to be popping up in front of me constantly.

  I’ve heard it said that a person should work through the diversity and challenges in their life. Funny how no one seems to have advice on how to do just such a thing when you’re stuck in the presence of a person that had the ability to annoy the hell out of you in between brief moments of heroism. True, it could
have been worse and I could have found myself partnered with the she-bitch, Teena Hawthorne as my apocalypse buddy, so I suppose I should be thankful for small favors.

  Still, I’d have Cal Mitty stuck at my side for at least the next twelve hours. The imposed curfew meant that some serious things had already been propelled into motion and I had my doubts that this particular action would be making things any better. While in theory an imposed curfew was good, for those that were in their homes and the communities locked in with those that were infected it would be a nightmare.

  Being locked down limited your ability to get free of a dangerous situation. Considering most people would be like Cal Mitty and try to discount outlandish theories about zombies, it meant they were more apt to ignore the signs and allow things to spread. While a curfew would eliminate the amount of people out in large areas to be infected in bigger groups, it also limited the abilities of people unknowingly caught with the infected.

  Honestly, it would have been better for people to be informed of what they were facing. This story about a flu like virus was going to have people caught completely off guard. Considering the powers that be had ordered a mandatory curfew with such little information seemed to be a sign things were actually getting out of hand already.

  Peering down at the tub and seeing a small pinkish line of water, I continued to soap myself off, hoping that eventually I’d get all of zombie boy's remnants off me. I can’t say that it pleased me to consider the alternative, but I had already spent far longer than I wanted in this shower. Time was not on my side right now.

  Turning off the water and stepping out onto my old, raggedy bath rug, I toweled myself off quickly. I didn’t give a damn about being socially acceptable and trying to navigate into my bedroom for underwear without being seen, so commando would be the choice for the evening.