by Jack Wallen
I‘d had enough of the jittery, slime bag soldier breathing down our necks pretending like we’d be helpless without him. What I wanted to do was remind him just who Bethany was, and that the likelihood of her surviving this insanity was quite a bit higher than his.
The sounds of Jacob crying filled the room again.
“That fucking baby!” Ronald shouted.
“If you so much as raise your voice toward either the mother or child once more, I will do things to you that would make your worst nightmares look like a Friday night couples’ skate. Remember who you’re talking to.” I stood between Ronald and Bethany.
The soldier stormed out without a word.
“Thank you,” Bethany smiled as she held Jacob and finally realized the baby might just have needed a good burping.
As the baby’s cries began to subside, Bethany wrapped him back up and gently laid him down in the closest thing to a crib we could find.
“Danielle, what exactly are we doing? Just playing survival isn’t enough.” Bethany looked at me, concern digging trenches in her forehead.
I thought long and hard about the question. Bethany’s question was valid. Both she and I had spent too much time and effort trying to stop this plague to give up.
“We have the cure for the virus,” Bethany stated the obvious. “We have to get it out to the people.” Again with the obvious.
“Bethany, I know. The problem is we don’t know where the people are. And we can’t very likely tell them to come to us because – we have no way of doing that. And, even if we did, drawing that much attention would bring death to our door.” I laid the implication on the floor between us, hoping Bethany would understand death would come in either ‘undead’ or ‘ZDC’ form.
She stared at me with wide eyes. Had this been the eighties, Kim Carnes and Betty Davis would have come into play. It wasn’t. It didn’t. I was certain numerous thought bombs began exploding in her mind. I knew Bethany Nitshimi was brilliant and brilliance could only be contained for so long before it insisted on making itself known.
Before I could probe into the genius mind, Ronald returned and dropped his own special kind of bomb on us.
“Ladies, we’ve got trouble.”
Trouble meant Ronald was about to start handing out weapons and insisting we protect the castle.
“I want you two to stay in here. Protect yourselves and protect that baby. I’m going up on the roof for some target practice.”
Our creepy guardian angel started to exit, but turned back for one last order.
“Don’t bother looking out the window. It’s going ugly faster than me on a Friday night drunk.”
And with that, the soldier was out the door.
“Shit,” Bethany huffed.
“What is it?”
The new mother turned to me, baby in arms, and stared. Her eyes were wide with either fear or anger – or maybe a mixture of both.
“Do you know how often I’ve been in this exact situation? Your God damned virus has nearly ended my life more times than I care to think about. I’m so fucking sick of this shit.”
“Bethany – ”
“No! I don’t want to hear your excuses any more. You fucked the human race. You bent us over and ass-raped us all.” Bethany’s angry words were punctuated by Ronald’s shots. “The only difference now is that I have a baby.”
Gunshot.
“This baby is my one and only connection to Jacob.”
Gunshot.
“And I have no idea if he or I will make it to see tomorrow morning.”
Gunshot.
Add to Bethany’s anger and Ronald’s shots, Jacob cries. All I could think of doing was quieting both mother and child, but I had no idea how. Truth be told, I had no right. Bethany’s anger was justified and I deserved every last word – for as long as she wanted to lash out. I had been waiting for this moment for the last few months. But now was simply not the time.
“Bethany please, you have to –”
“Don’t you dare tell me what to do!”
Gunshot.
Jacob cried loudly. Bethany’s tears rained down on the baby’s head, causing the boy to cry even louder.
“Bethany, we have to be quiet.”
“Danielle, it’s too late.”
Gunshot.
“They’re just outside our door.”
No sooner had Bethany said the words than the moans and screams of the undead began to pour in through the cracks and crevices of the walls.
Gunshot.
I could feel it. The end. If this was the moment just before the Grim Reaper enters the picture to claim the soul, then I welcomed his cold, clammy hand. Let death reach into the depths of me and pull out that precious intangible.
“Bethany, I didn’t mean for it to be like this. Lindsay and I… we thought… we thought we were going to save the world.” Why I grabbed for the past I had no clue, but there it was, coming out to haunt me.
“How? How could you think this had anything to do with saving mankind?” Bethany cried.
The moans and screams drew nearer.
Gunshot.
The gunshots more desperate.
“What we were doing together would have rid the planet of nearly all infectious diseases. Viruses would have become a thing of the past. Pandemics and plagues, nothing but campfire tales and ghost stories. We were so close before The Zero Day Collective saw to it to split us up. The ZDC forced Lindsay to begin working on the Quantum Fusion Generator, and Lindsay convinced me the only way we could prevent global spread of the Mengele Virus was to plant me inside the group.” My confession was gaining steam and Bethany was no longer interrupting. “But it didn’t work. Instead The Collective insisted the virus be released just before Lindsay’s device was unveiled.”
“Why are you telling me all of this? These are all pieces of information well documented in Jacob’s book and my blog!”
There was one bit of information Bethany could not have known, since I was the only human on the planet with the knowledge. Why I was hesitating to divulge that information, I did not know. She could sense something was boiling in the back of my mind and with a single, raised eyebrow, she insisted of full confession.
“The Heizer Sequence is the key. That was what Lindsay and I were working on. That sequence can act as a bridge between the cure and human DNA. Without that sequence there is no way the Mengele Virus can be defeated. I have the sequence, and not just on paper or committed to memory. I have the original strain, and with that strain we should be able to bring humanity back to life.”
In theory every word I spoke was true. In reality, given our current situation, the task was nearly impossible.
Nearly.
An inhuman crash did its best to knock the door to the room off its hinges. A lightning-bolt crack made its way down the center of the wood. On the other side of the door the familiar undead scream curdled the air around us.
Jacob let out a cry.
The pounding on the door grew furious until the wood began to splinter further. Bethany and I backed ourselves to the other side of the room as wood shards began flying. Finally, with a deafening roar, the door was torn asunder. In the door frame stood the largest zombie I’d seen; its neck thick with rope-like tendons as it let loose a hideous, glass-shattering scream. The deafening noise brought up the ire of the baby once again. When the monster heard Jacob’s cries it immediately grew silent and tilted its head back and forth, like a cat listening for its prey.
The zombie sniffed the air as it continued to listen. All movement in the room came to a breathless halt. Even the dust in the air seemed to stop – mid drift.
The silence was broken by the cooing of Jacob. As soon as the Screamer heard the sound it leaped across the room, next to Bethany, and snatched the baby from his mother’s hands. Bethany let out an earth-shattering cry and made a sudden leap toward the beast. The zombie swung out and sent Bethany flying across the room. Somehow she managed to get back to her feet a
nd launch a second attack. This time the Screamer grabbed Bethany by the throat with its free hand, and held her at a distance.
The zombie stared down at Jacob and sniffed his tiny head. This was it, the beast was about to open wide its maw and swallow the infant’s head whole.
Bethany tried to cry out, but the sound was stopped short by the beast focused on her baby.
The screamer took in another long, deep breath as if it were savoring the sweet baby smell before it devoured its human veal treat. The Earth’s gravity was pulling me down. I wanted to drop to my knees and weep, close my eyes, blind myself to the horror. I feared, with the death of Jacob, the fragile thread of hope we all held onto would unravel.
Bethany kicked out hard and somehow managed to twist out of the clutches of the beast. Oddly enough, the zombie ignored the escape and continued sniffing Jacob.
The mother pulled out her pistol and trained it on the beast. Thanks to the proximity to Jacob, she hesitated. The zombie remained, transfixed by the infant. It knew. The damn thing knew what miracle flowed through the baby. I had no idea how, but the foul thing was aware of who, or what, Jacob was.
The zombie finally looked up, let out a vicious roar as if to say ‘Back the fuck off,’ and turned to leave. Before Bethany could fire a kill shot into the zombie’s skull, a voice greeted us.
“Going somewhere, fuckface?” Out of nowhere, Ronald appeared in the doorway, rifle in hand, and shot the zombie point-blank. The rotting monster dropped and, fortunately enough, Jacob landed on top.
With a cry only a mother fearing for her child’s life could produce, Bethany rushed to Jacob and pulled him to her breast.
“Was that thing about to –”
“We don’t know what was happening,” I answered Ronald’s question as honestly as I could.
“It had my baby.” Bethany was near hysterics. “Did you see? It had Jacob… it smelled him. The Goddamn thing was about to – ”
“No Bethany, it wasn’t.” I had to say something, or the mother would certainly enjoy a much-deserved trip down memory lane clad in nothing more than a straitjacket and diapers.
Bethany looked at me as if she were about to rip my head off of my shoulders. I had to explain.
“I believe there’s more going on here than we thought. Bethany, listen carefully… the reason The Zero Day Collective was so interested in you was because of your baby. Jacob was the first child conceived between infected and non-infected DNA. That boy proved the human race could be forcibly evolved. The ZDC believes there is much to be learned from Jacob. They also fear his continued existence outside of their walls, because they have no idea what he is capable of. I, on the other hand, know what they are capable of and fear The Collective will stop at nothing to reclaim what they fully believe is theirs.”
Bethany let the words sink in. It seemed this was to be that moment where she would finally lose what little sanity her precious mind held onto and quickly spiral into some cold, lonely abyss.
I was wrong.
“Fuck them. Fuck them, fuck this, and fuck their plans. They try to take my baby they will die a thousand deaths and regret the moment they ever learned my name.”
“So, what do we do now?” Ronald brought us back to the now.
“I need to take a look at our dead friend here. Thank you, by the way.”
Ronald merely tipped his head toward me.
“Shouldn’t we drag the rotten meat sack outside? That thing starts rotting and it’s going to get funky in here.” Ronald nearly let a smile sneak onto his face.
“We will have to suffer the stench for a while. I have a feeling this wasn’t your garden-variety zombie. There was something altogether special about this monster and I intend to find out what.”
Special. I actually used the word ‘special’ to describe a zombie. What in the hell was wrong with me?
Bethany and Ronald glared at me as if I were crazy. My eyes dropped to the decomposing flesh-bag on the floor and all I could think of was:
‘Die, zombie die!’
Chapter 38
Undisclosed location
July 6, 2015
“Pile as much into this cart as you can. Who knows when we’ll be able to make another trip. And no perishables. This shit has to last without refrigeration,” Sam reminded Dom of the ways and means of survival in a post-apocalyptic grocery store.
Dom started off, with the cart, down the canned goods aisle. Corn, peas, beans… items he was wired to eat by a mother who insisted on force-feeding her boy as much soul food as she could. It was a mother who knew her little boy had a bright future, and wanted to help him in the most loving and southern motherly way she could.
Sam had a cart of his own and was stocking up on peanut butter and other foodstuffs that would out last Armageddon. Junk food, unfortunately, was a safe bet. So they would all survive and grow obese.
“Great,” Sam mumbled as one of the front wheels on the shopping cart wobbled and squeaked its hatred for having to actually do its job. Sam tilted the front-end of the cart up and let it drop down, a trick he learned from a psycho ex-girlfriend. The trick didn’t work. Neither had the ex. The cart continued voicing its displeasure.
The commander guided his cart around the end of the aisle. When Leamy’s eyes joined the cart the first thing they spied was a Moaner. The zombie was swaying through a collection of upturned displays.
Sam stopped pushing. The zombie continued swaying.
The soldier reached for his gun, but logic demanded as much silence as possible until it came time for the Earth-shattering kaboom. Instead the enemy would have to be taken out swiftly and silently. Sam glanced around in search of a weapon. Anything would do; though it would be preferable if said anything included a razor-sharp blade long enough to slice off a head in one, elegant swipe.
From a distance.
For once it seemed Lady Luck answered fate’s booty call and Sam found he had stopped directly in front of the deli. A deli could mean only one thing (with regard to zombie slaying) – knives.
The path from Sam’s location to the deli was clear. With ninja-like swiftness, Sam made his way behind the counter, where his eyes happened upon a row of glistening knives that could each lop off body parts of varying sizes. Sam grabbed what seemed like the perfect knife for slicing clean through a human neck. The blade sang a deadly song as it pulled from the stainless steel counter. Now all the armed man had to do was to sneak up behind the unsuspecting moaner and bring the blade down with enough force to lop off the head with a single blow.
The odds were certainly stacked against him. This assumption was made reality when Dom yelled Sam’s name, causing him to drop his knife. The zombie turned toward the nearest noise.
Sam.
It was ‘go’ time. Sam ran at the moaner full speed. When the two collided, assailant and target went down hard. Both the knife and the wind were knocked out of Sam as the undead shopper came down on top of him. Immediately the monster wrapped its fingers around the living head and, in typical fashion, began slamming it down on the floor.
“Dom!” Sam shouted, before stars started to fill his field of vision.
“Fuck!” The running back ran at the melee, hitting top speed in a heartbeat.
“I got it!” Dom yelled.
Before Sam’s brain could even comprehend what was happening, Dom had the knife in hand and was chopping away at the neck of the moaner. Not having enough experience with the removal of heads, his chops were sloppy so it took a while before the head slopped off to the floor.
Brownish blood covered Dom’s hands, arms, and face. The headless body fell to the floor with a cold, wet thud.
Sam lay motionless on the floor.
“Sam, it’s dead.”
Nothing.
“Sam, come on, don’t fuck with me.” Dom’s voice held suspicion.
Stillness.
Dom checked for and found a pulse. The leader was alive, just out cold.
“Son of a bitch,”
the young man shouted and gave the disembodied zombie head a kick. Dom dropped to one knee and gave Sam a few smacks on the face.
“Come on Sam… I need you here, buddy.”
A cow-like moan issued from the downed man.
“That’s it man, you can do it. Wake your ass up and help me get out of this bitch!”
As the last man standing, Dom decided not to waste any time. With hardly a strain, he lifted Sam’s body and carefully placed it in a shopping cart. After wheeling the Sam-filled cart to the front of the store, Dom finished the gathering of goods and returned to the entrance.
A plan was formed. It was simple. Get the food into the trunk of the car, get Sam into the passenger seat, and drive the car across the street to pick up the others.
Before he set foot outside of the grocery, Dom checked in every direction possible. There would be no more surprise attacks.
With the cart in hand, Dom rushed to the car, popped the trunk, and loaded up the goods. As he filled the car his stomach growled, begging him to open up something and quiet his ravenous hunger.
“Shut the fuck up before you get us killed!” Dom scolded his digestive system.
The car trunk slammed shut, sealing all the food inside. Dom took off to retrieve the stunned Sam.
Just before he reached the door he heard a sound – the lowing hum-like moan and the weakened cries for help. Dom dared not look over his shoulder, knowing full-well fear would grip his heart and freeze his feet in their tracks. Besides, he knew what was coming. He knew, with one-hundred-percent certainty, that sound was the zombie parade with its living buffet in tow. The sound of dragging chain and wire brought to mind Jacob Marley’s ghost and the fear that always accompanied watching “A Christmas Carol” as a child.
There would never be another Christmas. The tragic thought crossed the man’s mind. He loved Christmas and would always remember the special moments he and his mother shared together – alone and poor, but happy.
Dom managed to pull himself out of the fear-induced trance and grab the cart holding his friend. He pointed the steel cage on wheels toward the car and rushed as quickly as he could. As soon as the cart was next to the passenger door, Dom opened it and scooped out Sam, depositing him in the seat.