“I hadn’t even thought of it,” Val said. “What are you going to eat? Are you going to kill humans to survive?”
“Do you kill one human to save another?” Connor asked.
Brady answered, “Obviously, I hope I won’t need to eat. Hopefully I can find Sara quickly enough that feeding won’t be a problem. I’m only expecting this to take a day or two.”
“Nevertheless, the question has to be asked,” Connor said. “You could die if you don’t eat. I don’t know how long a zombie can go without feeding. It’s very likely you won’t find her before you need to feed. How zombie are you willing to become?”
When hard pressed with the question, Brady took a moment to search his soul. “I am prepared to do whatever it takes. A life for a life. Hopefully just my own.”
Seeing the atmosphere grew altogether too heavy, Val commented, “Just don’t eat me okay?”
“So that brings us up to the last topic,” Connor concluded. “Assuming the virus works and you maintain your sanity after being infected, how are we going to save your wife?”
“What do you predict we’ll need?” Brady asked.
“You’ll both need to drink the cure. I really don’t know how long it will take to change you back. My guess would be at least a day. Searching for her will probably take you into the very center of the swarm. And I have no idea how zombies will react to you. Will they be able to tell you’re different? There’s no way of knowing how the virus is going to affect your mind. I have no idea what this will do to you. How are you going to escape once you and Sara turn into humans again? What happens if they see you’re starting to turn into humans and attack you? There are so many possible questions!”
“I know,” Brady replied solemnly. “But the truth remains that we only have one cure. This means that we’ll need to cure both her and myself at the same time. So the safest option would be for me to lure her away somehow out of the swarm and into the open. There we can be transformed back safely and you two can pick us up.
“I hate to say it, but I think a lot of our plans will just need to be flexible. We don’t know what it’s like inside the swarm or how they’ll react to me or to me taking one of them out into the open.”
“Brady, the more I consider all this,” Connor said solemnly, “the more it seems to be like sheer madness. This is essentially just throwing your life away.”
“I’m sorry you think that,” Brady replied. “What do you think, Val?”
She looked into his deep eyes trying to understand their mysteries. “Don’t ask me what I think. If this is your plan, you do it. If you’re that convinced, I don’t think either of us will ever persuade you.”
“I remember you saying the idea was noble. I thought you supported it. What changed?”
“I guess I’ve grown fond of you,” she replied in a somewhat silly tone but then changed to be far more serious as she said, “I don’t want to see you eaten alive.”
“What makes you think I’ll die?”
“Connor is right. The plan is crazy. How could you do all that without losing your mind or dying?”
“Look at me,” he spoke in somber words that drew her attention. Brady stared into her eyes as if searching deep waters. His eyes darted about in her gaze until he uttered a soft “Hmm” without parting his lips. A moment later, as if Brady were a hound hot on the trail, their eyes locked as if a fiery rope burned between them. The tension grew until Connor moved from feeling merely uncomfortable to honestly fearful for the two of them. But at last the tension broke and Brady leaned back. “How long?” he asked her but she made no reply. “How long will you cover your wound with your hand pretending it’s not fatal? Can’t you see the blood is seeping out?”
She stared up at him as if slashed by wounding grief. Humor and laughter drained out of her leaving the person in front of them to be very unlike the Val they’d grown to love.
"Fine," she said. “Go throw your life away. I don’t care.”
She threw her blanket aside and went running from the room.
A very confused Connor watched her leave and turned to Brady. “What just happened? Is she dying?”
Brady sighed and bowed his head a little looking as if he’d just done a great work. “Secrets have a high price, Connor. And Val has bought hers twice over.”
Connor raised his palms towards the ceiling shaking his head. “What is that supposed to mean?”
Brady gave a long exhale as if to close the discussion. “We need to figure out the plan. Tell me about the cure? How does it work?”
Confused by Brady’s quick change in subject, Connor stumbled for a minute before saying, “Well, a lot of the cure I took directly from the virus. In their original design, they forced cancerous cells to reconfigure themselves back to a normal state. That’s how they ‘cured’ cancer. So I took that idea and just forced the real cure to reconfigure the overthrown cells, forcing them back into a normal state.
“I used my cure to make the cells change back and begin the reconstruction process. With the body brought back to its normal state, the decaying process should be reversed. The effects I’ve designed are truly amazing, if I do say so myself. Because it’s designed along the same constructs, the cure is as potent as the virus. I’ve successfully used it to restore massive amounts of dead tissue. It’s unlike anything I’ve ever seen.”
“It would have to be to restore a whole human body from zombification,” Brady commented.
“But all of that was just the physical side. As I mentioned earlier, a huge part of the virus attacks the brain. It completely changes the composition and functionality. A lot of the last few months I’ve been researching its side effects and trying to conjure up a way of reversing them. But this is where I’ve hit some walls. Because the virus targets the brain, it affects everyone differently. So there’s no telling how the cure will heal their minds. I can say the cure will return the person’s brain to a normal human being’s state. But will they retain the same personality or characteristics? I have no way of knowing. I can’t predict if they’ll even be the same person after revival.
“So it’s all educated guesses. But it’s the best I have.”
“You’ve done your work extraordinarily well. I could not have done any of this without you. You, sir, are truly a genius. When the weather is warm consistently, I say we start.”
∙ ∙ • ∙ ∙ ∙
Over the next several weeks, Connor continued doing the tests he could without using the remainder of the virus. Val remained distant for a day or two but eventually came around to be her old self again. And soon she acted as if nothing strange transpired.
One March night Connor had been working into the early hours of the morning, as was his custom, when he came out of his laboratory to find Val sitting on the couch. He found her silently, hypnotized by the falling snow. When she did not turn to acknowledge him, Connor followed her gaze to the fields of snow tinted blue in the moonlight.
“I think it’s very noble what you’re doing,” she began. She pulled up the blanket beside her, inviting him to sit down. “You’re a man of courage.”
“Brady is the one with courage. I just tinker.”
“Nonsense,” she replied. “It takes courage to watch your friend inject himself with zombie-itis. And courage to keep you from interfering when he's heading down a path like this.”
“Is that what happened to you? You’re obviously hiding something about your past.”
“I would tell you but you would leave me.”
“You’re wrong. I would never.”
“Do you think you’ll ever love again?”
Even though he’d dreamed of this moment dozens of times, the actual event caught him off guard. “I’ve been waiting for a question like that from you for a while now. I squared with my family’s death last summer. I’ve often thought I’d love again. Do you think you will love again?”
She turned her gaze to the window again. “Snipes' death seems like so long ago
now. That whole life does. I’m ready for a new adventure.”
Connor laughed a little at the thought of dating him being called an adventure. He moved his hand slowly down her arm until his hand clasped hers. She let her head fall slowly down onto his shoulder and the two watched the snow drifting softly.
That was the first night he held her in his arms.
∙ ∙ • ∙ ∙ ∙
Brady spent the remainder of the winter in his sanctuary. He had installed heaters in case they needed to use it as a bomb shelter or hideaway. He tirelessly worked on a piece of art for weeks and started writing little sentences in red paint in-between pictures and on the floor. They considered the most notable one to be: “as the branding of an animal so I have been marked for suffering.”
Val would watch him from time to time when Brady would allow it. As it began to take shape, Val saw before her a masterpiece portraying his next step. He painted a mass of blue coming in from the left side of the painting symbolizing his humanity. It brought with it everything common to them. On the other side, were waves of red bringing with it everything zombie. Both colors brought their defining characteristics pouring into the man in the middle, who by his appearance seemed half-human, half-zombie. Although this creature obviously struggled with the duplicity of his existence, he still managed to look below him in love. From his outstretched arm, a purple drop fell upon the zombies straining below him like baby birds in a nest awaiting their food. Val declared it his best work.
When winter finally gave way to spring, Brady became anxious to get started. Connor built a chamber where they could infect Brady in security. Both created a detailed plan that Connor forced Brady to memorize.
Brady repeated it yet again to humor Connor. “Get infected. Maintain sanity. Test to see if zombies see differences in me. If not, proceed to find Sara. Maintain sanity. Bring Sara, and others, if possible, to extraction zone. The extraction zone is the helicopter landing pad on the roof of the hospital, north of downtown. Cure them and myself. Maintain sanity. Once cured, fire flare and be picked up at the extraction zone. Maintain sanity. Be picked up by you two via helicopter and be transported to a new location outside of city for checkups. Live happily ever after. Maintain sanity. Maintain my sanity. Maintain sanity!”
“Perfect!” Connor applauded. “I’ve modified the virus to take effect immediately instead of having to murder you. Wasn’t that nice of me?”
“You’re the symbol of hospitality!” Connor busied himself with other duties for a moment before Brady spoke again, “Keep her close.”
Connor stopped what he did to cast a glance at his companion. “Val?” Brady nodded in agreement. Thinking Brady’s comment odd, Connor stepped out of the room to get something. Just then Val entered the room and immediately noticed Brady’s closed eyes and heavy breathing. A peace that she did not understand seemed to overtake him. She likewise grew solemn and extended him her hand. He looked up to her as if curious for a moment but then slowly took its comfort.
As Connor entered, Brady began shaking as he said, “You can spend months preparing yourself but in the end, you’re never really ready for this sort of thing. When it comes straight down to it, I’m scared.” Val squeezed his hand tighter.
Connor drew in the fateful breath to say, “We’re ready.”
Val stepped back. Brady nodded that he was ready. Connor reached in and injected the needle in his arm. Slowly the virus flowed into his vein. Brady became drowsy and soon slept soundly against the back of the chamber. He had a horrible nightmare of a discomforting tightness in his throat. By rasping for a time, a greenish slime began to drip from his mouth. Soon he held himself by his two hands resting firmly on the wall before him, as he vomited up globs of the greenish slime. It clung to his hands and soaked his clothing as it came out in torrents.
Still in his dream, he saw the walls coming in all around him. As they approached, he could feel their suffocating presence against his skin pressing against him. Now with his arms pressing firmly against the walls to stop their assault, he vomited up the last liquid his body could produce and continued on dry heaving. His mind warped and fought against him. It screamed inside his head so loudly Brady could hear no other noise. Like a bloody balloon, Brady felt his brain popping inside him. The sensation crippled him and he collapsed into the tide of green liquid now lining the floor.
At the flash of lightning outside, Brady realized now he suffered no dream. The thunder came against his ears far more powerfully than he remembered the clash of thunder. His ear drums felt like they would burst inside from its intensity.
Gaining a little strength, Brady found himself able to place his hands again on his container and peer up. There he found gnarled faces glaring down at him as if to kill him. One of the faces spoke but only a hideous cursing screech of terrifying words proceeded from it. Its noise scraped against his ear drums like fingernails and Brady thought he felt the wet sensation of blood in his ear. The one face wouldn’t stop its hideous onslaught of piercing words so Brady wailed against the side of the container desperate to stop or kill the thing. Ranting for a while finally caused the face to cease.
With his mind settling, he now heard a horrifying knocking noise off to his left. What had once been only the humming of a small generator now fell upon his ears like a blaring trumpet. He threw himself against the far side of the container hoping to escape the clamor, but found no rest. Finally guessing from his frequent glances towards the generator, one of the faces went to turn it off. With the generator silenced, Brady became aware of the terrible crashing of the rain against the roof. But this seemed more bearable.
Brady now had the energy to turn his attention to the two creatures. Factually a deep part of him knew them to be Connor and Val but his eyes testified against it. The two horrible things seemed both ominous and dreadful to him. Finally, when his mind overcame its fear of the faces, he tried to speak to them, but to his surprise they could not understand him at all. They now spoke in softer tones at him but sounded like garbled clamoring as if they were underwater. He brought his hand up towards one of the creatures and saw it now gnarled and deteriorated. In a defeated gesture, he slumped to the floor examining the rotting flesh that now covered his body. He slid over to rest his shoulder and head on the side of his cage, wheezing.
One of the creatures kept pointing to an object and then pointing to Brady. But Brady was too overwhelmed to try to understand. Then suddenly the creature opened a small door to the chamber and thrust the object into his arm. Brady winced back in pain and clawed at the small door. The creature withdrew and closed the door leaving the metal object hanging from Brady’s arm. For a long time Brady sat in pain, unmoving. When his mind finally began to clear, he realized Connor must have been trying to take some of his blood to do testing. He motioned to one of the creatures and pointed to the syringe accomplishing the first real communication between the two groups. Slowly the creature opened the small door again and this time Brady let him take the sample he needed.
As time progressed, Brady’s mind became clearer until he could recall most of the plan. Through the next several hours they did countless tests. Only when the two became convinced Brady remained in control of himself did they release him from his cage. Val attempted to wipe him off, but Brady became fascinated with the outdoors. Without giving her a chance to finish, Brady moved to the outside and stood under the eaves sticking his hand out into the rain. Though he shivered at its temperature, something seemed refreshing about being out in nature and away from the horrible equipment inside. Gathering his courage, he stepped into the rain letting it wash over his whole body. The drops beat against his skin in a most unusual sensation. Though the thunder and lightning startled him, he stood completely overwhelmed at the experience.
His heart resonated with nature. Though he always loved nature, now he felt as if his very existence depended on it. Once outside the terrifying equipment, his soul came alive. He tried to speak but instead uttered something si
milar to a wolf’s howl. The fears of his new state subsided completely and he turned to look back at his old two companions. With the rain running down him, they beheld him fully zombie. A terrifying beast. Connor looked solemnly at his friend. Even without the ability to communicate, he realized how deeply Brady swam in a sea unlike any waters he had ever known.
With no other reasons to delay, Connor handed Brady the vile containing the cure. He took it with his bulky awkward embrace. Connor drove around a truck with a horse trailer attached. At this, Brady became erratic. To him it seemed another cage. He wouldn’t even go near it until Val knelt beside him. Softly she touched his arm whispering into his festering ear. To Connor’s surprise he gently went with her into the trailer. Val announced she’d be riding in the trailer with him leaving Connor alone in the truck.
Val leaned against the inside of the trailer. She gestured for Brady to come sit with her. Brady sat between her legs and pressed his head against her chest like a child.
Connor fought back jealousy as the two huddled together and Brady moaned softly and closed his eyes. Val seemed like Brady's mother as she parted his hair with her hands.
Val looked up and noticed Connor's hesitation. She shooed him away with her hand only reinforcing Connor's feelings of jealousy and anger. Reluctantly Connor closed the trailer door and started their trek down the mountain.
∙ ∙ • ∙ ∙ ∙
Passing through Manitou Springs at the base of the mountain pass, they approached the edge of Colorado Springs and Connor pulled over. The morning light just broke over the horizon as Connor made his way to the rear of the trailer. He let down the trailer gate to find his two companions sitting, facing each other. Without delay, Brady stood to cast a glance at Val and another one to Connor before promptly exiting. His rotting body made its way to a nearby alley and disappeared leaving the two humans standing alone.
Before reaching the downtown area, Brady slipped inside a building. There he stashed the device in a place he hoped none would find it.
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