“It’s not him,” said the janitor, shaking his head.
“How do you know? The guy’s got no face!” Bob yelled.
“He’s also got no scar. The doc had a scar on his arm,” the man said, pointing to a spot on the zombie’s forearm, “right there. I’ll bet every person who works here has heard his story about the weasel attack.”
“Weasel attack?”
“Yeah, you know, they look like a ferret, but they’re a lot meaner.”
“I know what a weasel is. How in the hell . . .?”
“Hey, Clara, come here for a sec,” the janitor yelled.
The nurse started to walk over, but hesitated when she saw the faceless zombie.
“Don’t worry. He’s strapped down, but listen, these guys think this is Dr. Rayburn. What do you think?”
“W-well,” she said, stepping a little closer, “it looks like Dr. Rayburn. Look at the hair.”
The gray hair on the still-moving corpse was in desperate need of a trim, and it was sticking out all over.
“I always have to remind him when it’s time for a haircut,” Clara said, getting a little teary-eyed. “He forgets. He usually doesn’t comb it, either.”
“But what about the scar on his arm?”
“Oh, from the weasel attack,” she said, looking closer. “No, it’s not there. It’s not him, thank God.”
“It’s not the doc,” the janitor told Bob, shrugging.
Bob sighed and shook his head, dismissing the janitor and the nurse.
Madec waited until they were alone to speak again. “We have to assume that Rayburn and Hixson are still alive and that they’re out there somewhere with the real DVD.”
“Why both of them?”
“Rayburn didn’t transfer his clothing to a zombie without help. And if Rayburn had actually been bitten or killed, Hixson would have just left the phone on him. They’re both alive.”
“Okay, fine, now what are we supposed to do about it?”
“We need to retrieve that DVD at all costs. If it gets into the wrong hands, we could have trouble like you can’t even imagine.”
“What exactly do you think is on the DVD?”
“I think it contains information that could send us to our deaths.”
“Most of the world’s population is already gone,” Bob pointed out. “If anybody finds out about this, what are they going to do? It’s too late to point fingers.”
“Order will eventually be restored,” Madec stated. “If that day comes and word gets out that we had anything to do with the near-annihilation of our world, we’re all going to hang. People will search the ends of the earth to find us and destroy us.”
“I don’t think it’s going to happen any time soon,” Bob said, “but maybe you’re right. I don’t want to face a war-crimes tribunal when I’m an old man. Let’s bring them back.”
“There also may be information about a vaccine on the DVD,” Madec said.
“Do you think so?” Bob asked.
“If Petrov made a vaccine, I would think that he would have wanted to let someone know where it was, in case something happened to him. If that’s the case, it’s even more critical that we find the DVD.”
“So how do we find them? Helicopters? They’ll probably try to find a vehicle,” Burnell said.
“We’ll start with that,” Madec said, picking up a radio.
~*~
St. Mary’s Hospital, Lansing
After Autumn spoke to the doctors, she started for the elevator but did a double-take as she walked past a room. The patient didn’t appear to be alive. Quietly, Autumn made her way over to the side of the bed, watching the man’s face intently. After a few moments of no movement, he took a deep breath and began to snore. Relieved, Autumn stepped away, but as she turned to leave, she noticed through the window that the sky was a beautiful blue that day, though it looked like clouds were moving in. She crept past the sleeping patient to the window and watched in silence as the undead staggered aimlessly in the streets. Almost mesmerized by their random patterns, she jumped when she heard a thump. A dazed pigeon fell for a couple of feet and regained its composure, flying away from the window.
A slow smile began to creep over Autumn’s face as an idea formed. She turned and hurried to the elevator.
~*~
Lansing, Michigan
“Let me see,” Snake said, grabbing Mouse’s arm to examine it. He couldn’t help but smile when he saw what was causing the pain.
“Don’t shoot!” he hollered through the window. He yanked the nail from the wincing biker’s shoulder. “We’re on your side.”
A young man cautiously peered through the window, still holding the cordless nail gun.
“What do you want?” he asked.
Snake could see a mixture of fear and desperation in the man’s eyes. His gaunt features and shoulder length hair, which stuck out in every direction, gave him a slightly unbalanced look. He appeared to be no more than twenty and was shaking uncontrollably.
“We need to rent a loader,” Snake said with a smile. “You open for business?”
“Take whatever you want,” the young man replied. “Just don’t let those flesh-eaters in.”
“Flesh-eaters,” Snake grinned. “I like that. You get us the keys to that loader, and we’ll take you somewhere safer if you want.”
“You got food?”
“Full cafeteria,” Snake answered.
The young man disappeared around the corner and returned a few seconds later with a set of keys. “Might as well fill it up. There’s a tank out back.”
“I’m Snake, and this is my posse,” Snake said, pointing to his men, as well as Lindsey and Helga. “Relax. They’re not as bad as they look.”
“Billy,” the man said, hesitantly shaking Snake’s hand. “Nice to meet you, I think.”
“Anyone else in there?” Snake asked. “We’ve got plenty of room.”
“Just my boss,” Billy replied, “but he’s dead. He’s got about thirty nails in his head.”
“Did he go zombie on you, or did he just short your paycheck?” Snake joked, trying to ease the man’s anxiety.
“No,” Billy answered without cracking a smile. “He went zombie.”
Fish stuck his head in and looked around the small room. There was a large desk with what appeared to be some sort of stereo equipment on it. A set of headphones lay nearby on the floor. He was about to comment about someone taking their music a little too seriously, when he realized what it was.
“Is that a radio setup?”
“Yeah, my boss is . . . was an amateur operator. What do they call them, HAM operator? He had a lot of fun with that thing.”
“It still works?” Snake asked.
“I guess. I don’t know how to use it, but before he got bitten, my boss was trying to reach other people on it. He’s got a couple different kinds of radios. One you can talk on and one is just for listening.”
“They could both come in handy,” Fish said.
“How would you feel about us taking this stuff back to the hospital with us?” Snake asked. “Maybe someone can figure out how to use it.”
“Fine with me,” Billy said with a shrug. “Anything we leave here will probably get looted anyway. Take whatever you can use. My boss sure doesn’t need it anymore. You might need the antenna on the roof, too.”
They loaded all of the radio equipment into one of the large rental trucks, which was slightly longer than the linen truck they already had. They also took a second truck, knowing they’d need the extra space to transport all the survivors from the school if the rescue went as planned. The new trucks would make a useful addition to their small fleet back at the hospital.
Wombat climbed up onto the roof of the building and took down the radio antenna, which was small enough to fit in the back of the rental truck. While he was busy with the antenna, the rest of the group added some other smaller equipment from the yard that might come in handy. One of the bikers mention
ed that they needed flashlights, and Billy directed them toward several construction-type lights. He also had a couple flashlights tucked away in a drawer, and he pulled those out, too.
Since Snake’s last operator had carelessly let the machine go up in flames, and Billy seemed to know how to operate the loader, Snake let him drive it.
As soon as Moose returned from leading the dead away, the caravan left for the school, letting the loader go behind the bikes. Each time he came across a car in the way, Billy simply moved it to the side, clearing a path for the trucks behind him. By the time they got back to the school, Billy had a nickname; Wild Bill.
When he heard it, he did something he hadn’t done in quite some time. He smiled.
~*~
St. Mary’s Hospital, Lansing
“Dr. Doune!” Autumn exclaimed, out of breath. “I’m going on break.”
Doune glanced over, and Autumn could tell that he was suspicious. She had done her best to remain calm, but she was anxious to get up to the roof and that excitement had obviously shown through. If Dr. Doune found out what she was up to, he’d never let her do it, so she quickly tried to think of a cover story. Before she could say anything, the laptop made a beeping sound, meaning that Doune had gotten a reply to his last post.
“Go ahead, Autumn,” the doctor said, turning his attention back to the discussion online.
After running back to the lab to get a small box and a few other things, Autumn returned to the fifth floor and went to the snack machine, hoping to find a small bag of potato chips, but the machine was empty.
“Are you kidding?” Debbie said. “I think Eric had every one of those vending machines cleaned out within a couple days.”
Autumn checked the machines on the other floors, too, but the RN was right. They were all empty. She finally went down to the cafeteria, hoping to sneak out with some bread without having to answer a lot of questions. When she reached the kitchen, she was happy to see a fresh batch of cookies on the counter.
“Take a few,” Theresa insisted. The cook was determined to help put some weight on Autumn, who was still thin from her cancer treatments.
“Thanks. Don’t mind if I do,” Autumn said, grinning as she grabbed three cookies and headed immediately for the elevator.
The roof was littered with vents, air conditioning units, and pigeon droppings. A small utility room was in the center of each of the two wings, and a parapet lined the perimeter. The largest part of the roof was at the junction of the two wings, which was where the helicopters normally landed.
Autumn looked around, trying to find the perfect spot for her trap. She set the box upside down, and it immediately blew over, prompting her to move the box closer to the parapet wall to shelter it. Propping up one side of the box up with a tongue depressor that she had acquired in the lab, she placed a couple of cookie crumbs under the box so that they could be reached from the open side. She stood back and surveyed her trap. Tapping it a couple times, she finally got the box to fall on top of her hand. It was too light, she decided. Pulling a loose brick from the wall, she placed it on top of the box and reset the trap.
Knowing there was no guarantee that her prey would trip the wooden trigger, she pulled out a roll of dental floss that she’d stuffed into her pocket. She tied one end around the stick then ran the floss across to the utility shed, breaking it off when she was sure it would be long enough. Satisfied with the second test, she reset it and quickly went to sit where she could peek around the corner as she held the other end of the string, waiting for her prey.
~*^*~
~14~
Lansing, Michigan
As the caravan made its way down the street toward the school, Billy continued to push vehicles out of the way, sometimes flipping them onto their sides when it was necessary. Besides clearing the road, they were creating a makeshift wall to keep the dead back. There were gaps, but Snake began to wonder just what it would take to create walls along most of the roads they used. He decided to bring it up to the others later.
As the school came into sight again, Snake could see that it was still surrounded by a mass of the dead. After finalizing a few details of the rescue plan, he motioned for the people on the roof to drop down out of sight. The drivers of the trucks and the loader did the same, leaving those on bikes as bait.
Crouched down in the cab of one of the rental trucks where he couldn’t be easily seen, Snake peeked up now and then to check on the progress of the dead parade. When there were only a few stragglers left, he finally signaled for Billy to pull the loader as close as he could get to the school building. The trucks pulled in behind him.
Wolf was lifted to the roof in the loader’s bucket to help with the evacuation. The first two people were carefully lowered to the ground, and once the others saw how it was done, it went quickly. By the time the bikes returned, everybody was on the ground.
“Get these guys some water,” Snake said. “Then we’ll load up.”
At Dr. Martinez’s suggestion, Snake had started carrying a first aid kit and bottled water in the truck, enabling them to start getting the survivors hydrated immediately.
“Thank you for helping us,” said an exhausted-looking woman. She offered Snake her hand. “I’m Crystal.”
“Snake,” he said, shaking her hand. “Pleased to meet you.”
The woman took a long shaky breath and said, “There might be more people in the building.”
“Do you know where they’d be?” Snake asked.
“No,” she said.
“Any idea if they’d be together or scattered around the building? I just want to know what to expect if we go inside.”
“There was another group, but I’m not sure what happened to them,” she explained. “We had been barricaded in the gym since the beginning of this whole thing. A helicopter landed on the roof one day, and we were able to talk to the pilot through a vent. He didn’t have any way to get through the roof to us, so the plan was for him to come back in the morning with help. That night, there was an outbreak, and half of the people in the gym were attacked before we could do anything.”
“I saw Caleb bite Brianna,” one of the little girls said.
The woman bent down and gave the child a hug then said, “Cara, why don’t you go see Mrs. Martin while I talk to this gentleman?”
The little girl hurried over to a woman who was helping to hand out water.
“How did someone get infected if you were barricaded inside the building?” Snake asked.
“We’re not sure,” the woman said. “Everybody had been checked for bites, and there hadn’t been any contact with those . . . things, for days. Apparently Cara, the little girl who was here a moment ago, may have seen the whole thing. I guess she was too terrified to wake anybody up, but she said one of the boys attacked another child, starting the outbreak.”
“So he may have been infected earlier, but it took days for him to change?” Snake asked, surprised to hear it.
“Yes. It happened in the early morning, close to dawn. All we can figure is that the first ones who were attacked never even woke up, or weren’t able to scream if they did wake up. Most of them had their throats ripped out.”
She began to cry, and Snake gave her a couple minutes to compose herself before she continued.
“I was on guard duty that night. All I could hear was the usual snoring and people rolling over in their sleep. There was nothing unusual. Then I heard something that just didn’t sound right. I got up and walked over with a flashlight.”
She took a deep breath and looked up at the sky for a moment before continuing.
“I heard horrible noises as I got closer to the far corner, and I knew . . . but I didn’t want to believe it. I had to be sure before I woke everybody, so I shined the flashlight on the corner of the room. There were eight or nine of them. They were hunched over the people who were lying on the mats, and they were feeding. I saw one little girl chewing on an arm. It was so small.”
She
paused to pull herself together again before picking up her story.
“It was a bloodbath,” Crystal said. “I can’t even begin to describe how terrible it was. I’ll have nightmares for the rest of my life. I screamed, and the others woke up. The ones that had turned suddenly seemed to realize there was a whole roomful of prey. They got up and began to move around, attacking others. By this time, more of the victims had changed, and it was chaos. We couldn’t fight them all off, so we had to leave the gym. We got about halfway down the hall and ran into more of them. We got split up in the confusion. One group eventually made it to the roof, just as a helicopter was landing. The pilot evacuated them, promising to come back for the rest of us. I only know this because one of the teachers refused to leave. Instead, he came back to help us get to the roof. Once we were up there, he and two other teachers went back down to try to find the others, but we never saw any of them again.”
“So they might be in the building, or it could be full of infected,” Snake said, “or both.”
The woman nodded. “I’m praying that they made it to one of the rooms, but there were so many screams.”
“Okay. We’ll check it out,” Snake said. He looked around and saw that some of the dead were starting to wander back. “We’re going to have to make it fast.”
He looked back at Crystal, whose eyes seemed distant.
“This isn’t your fault,” he told her.
“It most certainly is,” she said, walking away.
Snake watched her go, knowing he’d need to talk to her again later. The guilt was coming off of her in waves.
~*~
Snake picked a handful of people to go in with him, leaving the rest to keep things clear outside. Pulling Fish aside, he said, “You’re in charge out here while we’re gone. Go ahead and hand out any extra silent weapons to anybody that’s willing to use them. If the dead come back, load everybody into two of the trucks, and get out of here. Just leave us one truck and keys, in case we come out with more survivors.”
Dead, But Not For Long (Book 2): Pestilence and Promise Page 12