Dead Outside (Book 1)

by Oliver, Nick

  The line through security was even longer because of it being the beginning of summer. People love to come see that mouse. Several people were discussing the disease and riots in Asia. After a while I just started drowning out all of it. They just kept repeating the same things over and over anyhow. The only other conversations going on were how this was one of the hottest summers on record. I knew how that felt, living in Florida, but I stayed in air conditioning as often as possible, otherwise I'd lose my mind.

  It took me about half an hour before I finally got to the end of the line in security. I had already taken off my shoes so that I could just place them on the tray, and emptied my pockets into another.

  I went through the metal detector without incident, then put my things back in my pockets, grabbed my bag and walked toward the terminal where my plane was waiting. Along the way more people were talking about crazed riots, diseases, the ridiculous heat wave and now something about a soccer game.

  I reached my gate and checked my phone for the time, it was 6:45. My flight wasn’t for another half hour so I found a seat near a window and sat down. I looked out at the night sky and all the lights on the runways, planes, and vehicles.

  I was just about to drift off to sleep when they announced for my plane to be boarded. “Flight 646 to Cleveland now boarding.”

  I stood up, pulled my boarding pass out of my pocket and grabbed my suitcase. It must be a relatively empty flight I figured, since there were few people sitting around me. I walked up to the lady scanning the passes.

  “Have a great Flight,” she said with a smile.

  “Thanks,” I said returning the smile. “I’ll try not to sleep through the whole thing.”

  While walking down the tunnel connecting the gate to the plane I stuffed my boarding pass back into my pocket and pulled my lucky black baseball cap that Sarah gave me a few hours ago out of my bag. I slid it on my head right before I stepped onto the plane.

  My seat was about halfway down the plane. I put my bag in the overhead bin and sat down. I watched as only about two dozen people boarded the plane and since nobody sat next to me I took the window seat. One guy seemed pretty nervous, had his arm in a sling and coughing into a handkerchief. It didn't bother me though, at least one person on every flight is sick, no point in avoiding it. After I buckled I pulled out a pillow from the pocket on the back of the seat in front of me and leaned my head against the window.

  I closed my eyes as the Flight Attendant started telling everyone what do if the masks drop, I’d probably been on more flights then all the other passengers combined, so I could probably recite the instructions as well as the flight attendant.

  It didn’t take me long to fell asleep. The last thing I remember, the Flight Attendant was demonstrating how to inflate the life vest in case the plane crashed over water.

  8:00 AM, June 13

  I woke up to see that the fasten seat belt sign being turned off. I looked out the window and saw that we had landed already and everybody was getting their bags out of the overhead bins. I stretched my arms out and stood up to get my own bag. The man seated across the aisle from me looked at me with a surprised look on his face.

  “Did you really sleep through the take off and landing?” he asked.

  “Yeah,” I replied without even thinking. “Why?”

  “I get too nervous that the plane will crash or something,” he said with a slight shake to his voice.

  I let out a chuckle, “More people die in their cars pulling out of their driveway than in plane crashes. I’ve been flying for twenty years, so I’m just used to it I guess.”

  “Twenty?” he asked perplexed. “You don’t look much older then twenty.”

  I chuckled again, “Twenty-five actually. I’ll be twenty-six in a few weeks.” I pulled my bag out of the bin and closed it, “My dad works for an airline, so I fly all the time.”

  “Oh well this is my first flight,” he said nervously. “I’m just glad to be alive.”

  The Flight attendant opened the door to let people off the plane.

  “Well congratulations for surviving,” I said to him with a smile. “Good luck surviving the dangers outside.”

  “Thanks.” He said as I walked to the front of the plane to get off.

  I had to go get my bags from the Baggage claim. As I walked past the other gates I noticed that people were still discussing riots and diseases, but now not just in Asia but in Europe and Africa too.

  I flipped open my phone and called Roxie so she wouldn’t hurt me later.

  “Hey, did you make it there alright?” she asked right off.

  “Yeah, no crashes today,” I joked. “Isn’t it a little early for you to be up young lady?”

  “It’s 8:00 in the morning. Nick and I are watching a movie.” She answered.

  “That’s funny. I don’t hear a movie in the background,” I observed.

  “Oh that’s right, we’re having sex,” she admitted with an almost sarcastic tone, obviously trying to make me uncomfortable though I’d accepted her choices a long time ago and didn’t doubt it was true. “I didn’t mean to lie to you.”

  “You would,” I rolled my eyes. “Have fun, I’ll talk to you later.”

  “Will do!” She hung up. So I slid my phone back into my pocket.

  I stopped to get a drink at a coffee shop and a TV there was showing a news broadcast about a gang fight in New York where a couple dozen people were killed and almost fifty more were injured. The News anchor said that it was two rival gangs apparently attacking regular citizens. I shook my head in disbelief. Why would two rival gangs just team up and start killing innocent people for no reason? I got my coffee and continued on.

  When I finally got to the baggage claim my bag was one of the last ones there. I grabbed it and saw my Dad already parked in a line of cars out the door.

  "How you been?" he asked as I opened the door to his truck.

  "Good," I answered with a lie, "How bout you?"

  "Great," he smiled, most likely seeing through my lie, "Ready for the work weekend?"

  "As long as you got plenty of whiskey and shotgun rounds I'm ready to go." I smirked. Even though the point of the weekend was general upkeep and to chop wood for winter and have it ready for hunting season, we took plenty of breaks to fire off a few rounds, and once the sun went down the bottles came out and it was party time.

  "Well you know how we almost ran out last year?" He asked as we pulled out of the airport loading zone.

  "Yeah, the last night I had to drink vodka," I shivered, not being much of a fan of vodka.

  "Don't worry we'll have enough whiskey, I bought a case his time." My dad said rather proudly.

  "I thought you said you we'd have enough?" I said sarcastically.

  He glanced over for a second and let out a deep belly laugh that always brought a smile to my face.

  9:00 AM June 20

  I loaded the last cooler into the back of the truck. We were leaving in a few minutes, and everybody had something to do. My mom, aunts and grandmother were inside the cabin doing last minute packing, while my uncles were putting out the camp fire, and stacking the remainder of the firewood behind the cabin for next year. The last two days for me had consisted of chopping wood and dusting everything inside, much to my chagrin. If it hadn't been for shooting off a few rounds during the day and the drinking at the end of each night I might have lost my mind. My grandmother had cooked us plenty of amazing meals as well, so we didn't go starving.

  I slammed the tailgate shut and called for my Dad. He was still loading things into my grandmothers van.

  “Alright Dad, I’m leaving now so I can gas up the truck.” I opened the door and hopped into the seat and sat down. I shut the door and rolled the windows down and my Dad came to the window.

  “Well your grandmother's van is already gassed up, so we'll probably beat you there,” he said. “I’ll call you when we leave.”

  “Okay, my phone hasn’t been getting service lately, s
o I probably won’t get your call,” I told him. “But call anyway. Who knows it might come through.”

  He nodded and went back into the cabin. I shifted the truck into drive and pulled past the my Grandmother's van and two trucks belonging to my Uncles to get out onto the road. I cranked the radio to some classic rock, my favorite music to drive to.

  I drove for about a half hour on curvy back roads contouring to the landscape which consisted of hills and valleys, all zigzagging around like something a kindergartener might scribble on a piece of paper. I reached the gas station located just before the highway and pulled off.

  My dad had given me his credit card to pay for gas, which was a good thing, I doubted my bank account could afford to gas up my own Ranger, let alone his full size truck.

  As I held the nozzle for the gas pump I saw the convoy of my parents and uncles driving past me and onto the highway. I waved to them as they passed and got a honk of the horn from each of them.

  Once the gas tank was full I got back in the cab and got onto the highway, which from there is a 3 hour straight shot to my grandmother’s house, depending on traffic.

  After another hour or so of driving, I noticed several police cruisers and an ambulance speeding up from behind me. They sped past me and off into the distance. I didn’t think much of it until another small convoy came about five minutes later. Then I noticed that several other vehicles were speeding past me, which was odd, because I was already going about ten miles an hour over the speed limit. Most of them were loaded up with tons of supplies, almost like everyone in the state decided to go camping on the same weekend. Most of them were heading north along with me, though there were a shit ton more headed south, away from Cleveland.

  It was the summer. People were most likely just heading home from their vacations or just starting them.

  Then I started to see several Military trucks heading north as well. They weren’t all supply trucks though. Some of them were loaded up with soldiers, all of whom had full gear and weapons.

  “Now that’s not something you see every day,” I said to myself, watching the trucks speed past everybody.

  I was about an hour away when traffic leading away from Cleveland was bumper to bumper, and fewer and fewer people were heading toward the city, most were trying to leave. The closer I got the more military and emergency vehicles I saw going to and from Cleveland. There were quite a few fender benders along the shoulder of the highway. I even saw two men beating the crap out of each other, then one guy bite the other on the arm. I didn’t want to get involved in anything like that, so I just drove past them.

  I was paying too much attention to the opposite lanes, so when I glanced back to the lane in front of me my eyes widened at the sight of oncoming cars. I veered hard right just barely missing an SUV. After the SUV flew passed me, a minivan came out of nowhere and scraped the right side of the truck, taking my side mirror with him and nearly causing me to spin out. The minivan just kept driving as if it didn’t happen and I was too busy dodging the other maniacs driving on the wrong side of the road to even think about trying to go get the idiot’s insurance information. I got off the highway on the next exit. Dozens of other cars were following the SUV’s example to beat the traffic in their correct lanes.

  It seemed like there was an accident almost ever hundred feet even off the highway, and I could tell why, people were speeding, passing illegally, and even driving along sidewalks and through front yards. I had to dodge quite a few crazed drivers as well as pedestrians. People were just walking out into the middle of the road like they had no idea where they were. Some were running, but most were just walking or stumbling around.

  I pulled over to the side of the road when my phone started ringing and grabbed it. It said I had a new text message from Sarah so I opened it and it read:

  “Sam, have you been watching the news? I can’t believe what’s happening! Text me back as soon as you get this!”

  I was just about to reply when I received another text, then another. I eventually got all eighty-nine of them, they were all from Roxie and Sarah, and they all mentioned riots happening in Orlando and lots of strange assaults around town. I looked up and saw a person walking toward the truck. I gulped and got a little worried. He was just staring at me, mouth open slightly, letting out a moan, shuffling a bit, almost dragging his left leg. I stuck my head out of the window.

  “Are you okay sir?” I asked. His eyes seemed to widen and he began moving a little bit faster. He was about five yards away now. I looked a little closer at him and noticed his shirt was torn at his right shoulder and was soaked with blood.

  The man reached the side of the truck and as I was about to ask him what happened he reached his hands through the window and grabbed my arm, His hands were cold and clammy, I tried to shake him loose, but his grip was strong. His face was determined, and his mouth was wide open, jaws sapping and dripping with blood, it was running down his chin and on his chest. The man tried to bite my arm, pulling it toward his gruesome jaws, but I punched him in the forehead. Though it only momentarily threw him off balance, it barely seemed to faze him at all.

  I shifted the truck back into drive and hit the gas, peeling out and knocking the man off his feet. He held onto my arm for a while, almost pulling my shoulder out of its socket, but eventually he lost his grip. I looked in the rear view mirror. He rolled several times, tumbling in all sorts of awkward directions, but he somehow managed to get back up and he began to follow me with a limp.

  “What the hell was that?” I asked breathing heavily. My heart was racing. It was like the whole world just decided to go to shit all the sudden.

  I sped the rest of the way to my Grandmother’s house, driving around abandoned cars, through sidewalks, even side swiping a van that was in my way. I finally pulled into my grandmother's house and saw my Grandmother’s van already in the driveway. It had a decent size dent in the bumper and a smashed headlight with blood sprayed around the damage. Normally I would have been concerned and confused, but given the kind of reckless and crazy driving I’d seen on the way here, and the fact the truck I’d been driving wasn’t much better, I wasn’t nearly surprised.

  I put the truck in park, hopped out and ran inside. My parents were watching the news. I didn’t say anything and neither did they, we just all stared at the TV completely speechless.

  Chapter Four: Decisions

  12:30 PM June 20

  I stared dumbfounded at the television screen in front of me. There were images of panicked people running down a city street. Suddenly the camera zoomed in on one person in particular. He was shuffling at a much slower rate then everyone else around him.

  A chill ran down my spine, the man had the same blank stare that the guy on the side of the road had, and was shuffling at about the same speed too. An unfortunate runner tripped over himself right in front of the shuffling man. Before the now panicking individual could get back to his feet, he was in the other man’s grip, and screamed in agony as he was bitten on the shoulder.

  My mother gasped, “I can’t believe they are showing that on television.”

  I saw a little symbol in the corner of the screen. “It was a live feed, and I don’t think they realized that was going to happen.”

  “Quiet!” my dad boomed from across the room. I'd heard that tone growing up numerous times, mostly when I was misbehaving.

  The image of the street was replaced by the Anchor, “Once again, we apologize for the disturbing images, but we have breaking information from a medical professional, and his explanation of the events taking place.”

  The feed flickered to a doctor in an emergency room. The reporter in front of him looked pretty frazzled. He was talking to a doctor, and the doctor’s white coat was covered in blood, like he’d just gotten out of surgery or something.

  “What can you tell us about the disease doctor?” the reporter struggled to maintain his composure. It was like he was too afraid to ask, or maybe he just didn’t want to kno
w.

  “First of all, it’s a virus,” the doctor said rather professionally, as he removed his bloody gloves. “It’s blood borne, and saliva borne. Not airborne.” He made sure to stress the last part. “It’s spread through bites, scratches, or if you get infected blood in an open wound. Any direct contact should be avoided with any infected fluids.”

  “What are the symptoms?” the reporter inquired.

  “Well, the first twenty-four hours are a slow decline in energy and strength. The second twenty-four hours include fainting, and extreme exhaustion, to the point of not being able to function normally. By the forty-eight hour mark, the infected individual is barely conscious, and will pass away before fifty hours. We aren’t sure yet what the exact percentage of death is yet, but from what we know it is high, every patient we’ve had reported as infected has died.”

  The doctor took a deep breath. “Those who pass away will,” he paused for a second, as if to choose his next words carefully, “Reanimate.”

  “Reanimate?” the reporter asked with a perplexed look on his face. “Could you elaborate?”

  The doctor’s eyes dropped to the floor for a second. “Well, don’t quote me on the terminology, it’s the most appropriate word my colleagues and I could agree upon. The corpse of the diseased undergoes an unusual transformation caused by the virus. The body retains basic motor functions, but limited brain activity, exclusively instinctive drives.”

  The reporter’s eyes dropped for a second, looking at his own arm, and then shot back up to the doctor, “So, they come back to life?”

  “Not In the sense that the individual wakes back up the same as they were when alive. They retain no memory of their past lives as far as we can tell, and are extremely hostile toward other people, even loved ones, and should be restrained before they reanimate.”

  “Restrained?” the Reporter seemed surprised. “They are that dangerous?”

  “Yes, you should restrain their hands and feet, and call the local authorities,” the doctor hesitated for a moment again. “They will know where to go from there.”