by Cass Kim
Holly nodded and passed it to her aunt. After a few moments of fiddling the radio began to broadcast. “- three hundred currently in containment in downtown hospitals. The emergency overflow is the highest it has been at the University hospital, and all emergency rooms across the city are beyond capacity.” Holly swallowed hard. It sounded like their patch jobs here at home would have to be good enough to last a while. Luke shoved up off the armchair, heading back into the kitchen for more water. He’d had at least ten glasses since they got home.
“We have a new report from the CDC. They are getting preliminary test results back from the broader screening. The results indicate that the cause is in fact not a drug, but virus—” The sound of glass shattering broke Holly’s concentration. Her heart began its wardrum rhythm again. She instantly thought of the broken window by the door. They hadn’t remembered to put a blanket up to cover it.
After a moment of heart pounding silence, she realized the sound had come from inside the house. She spotted Luke on his hands and knees, picking up the larger pieces of his drinking glass by hand.
June and her Aunt were both still focused on the radio. She couldn’t tell if they’d even heard the breaking glass. She was getting up to grab the broom when Luke jerked, muttering out a curse. Of course he’d cut himself. That’s why you never picked up broken glass pieces, even when they were big.
“June, can you sweep this up? I just realized that we never covered the window by the door. I’ll take him to the bathroom and help him clean up his hand if you and Aunty Mir can handle that stuff?” Holly was so tired. Her voice was brusque and she knew she sounded like she was giving orders. She just couldn’t care anymore today. She would do better again tomorrow.
June nodded absently, and started to unfold herself from the couch, her attention shifting to the room around them.
Holly padded over to the edge of the kitchen, stopping a few feet away to avoid the glass. “Come on Luke. Let’s go to the bathroom.” They’d lit a few candles in there earlier, so she left the extra flashlight where it was still propped on the counter. She figured she would be able to see well enough.
Luke followed her, movements stiff. She hoped he hadn’t cut himself deeply. He was probably just still struggling with the day. He’d been so weird since they’d gotten back. But maybe not. Maybe he was just weird anyhow. She had to remind herself that she didn’t really know him. Maybe this was just how he handled stress, by being introverted. Until today she wouldn’t have pegged herself as the type to handle stress of this level by taking a leadership role. You never knew how people could adapt.
In the bathroom she moved the candles into a cluster by the mirror to better enhance the light. Luke squinted his eyes and turned away. “I’m...uh...I’m just not going to look, okay?” His brow was dripping sweat now. This seemed like something more than just shock and adrenaline. Holly shrugged. They’d worry about that tomorrow when things would hopefully be less dangerous. They’d get him to a doctor or his mom or something.
She pulled his hand over the sink, spreading his fingers back to see the small chunk of glass stuck in his palm. She reached over, intent on plucking it out very carefully. She wished she had a pair of tweezers, but those had been lost from the medical kit long ago. Biting her lip, she took a deep breath and held it, her finger tips steady. She had just grasped the glass piece when Luke’s body jerked and spasmed.
“Damnit Luke!” She jerked her hand back, a tiny cut on the tip of her finger. Gross, now she had his blood on her hand too. She let go of his hand and turned the faucet on full blast. She’d just finished scrubbing her hands clean when she realized Luke hadn’t responded at all. He hadn’t apologized. He hadn’t yelled at her for yelling at him. Slowly, she turned her eyes to the mirror. She could see his reflection there. His eyes were weirdly luminous, reflecting back too much of the dancing candle light.
He jerked again, his face contorting into a grimace. Luke turned away from her, then whipped back, staring hard at her back. The flickering candle caught the glint of spittle gathering at the corners of his mouth.
What had the radio been saying when he dropped that glass? The results indicate that the cause is in fact not a drug, but a virus. What else had they said? Why had she stopped listening to help him?
His breathing was a rapid panting behind her. A grunt of pain burst from him as he spasmed again, his back arching unnaturally. This couldn’t be real. Holly thought if she just didn’t turn around, didn’t see him with her own eyes, maybe it would go away. They had survived the city, and they had the right to be safe here.
Another grunt, his hands rigid claws in the mirror. She cringed against the clacking sound of his jaw clenching and unclenching. Still pressed against the sink, she knew he was between her and the door. He was taking up all of the space in the small bathroom, contorting, jerking. His lips were peeling back into a snarl, his mouth foaming.
Holly gulped and slowly turned around.
Epilogue
Holly leaned her head against the window on the bus. Three more hours and she’d be home. It seemed like years ago that she’d left, not a mere four weeks. Her parents had gotten home the week before. They’d been holed up in their bunk room on the cruise ship throughout the outbreak. Apparently those infected on the cruise ships spasmed wildly, and then almost all jumped off the ships and swam. Since they were already pulled away from port, they were assumed drowned. Some bodies had begun washing up on shore, according to the news broadcasts.
Since her parents had no contact with the infected, they had been released after a short series of medical tests upon docking. Holly, June, and Miranda had all been subjected to a lengthier quarantine. With the overcrowded hospitals and the CDC setting up medical camps throughout the city, it had been a horrendous experience. At first they drew blood daily. Then slowed to every other day. Now she was being sent home with instructions to get blood drawn every other week for the next quarter. If she never saw another needle or sleeping bag the rest of her life, it would be too soon.
Holly was too hot to keep her heavy sweater on, so she pulled it off and stuffed it into her backpack. Looking at her bruised inner arms, where they’d had IVs inserted for two weeks, she thought of Luke. Shit. Holly shoved down her feelings of anger and guilt. Restless, she tapped out another one of the pills they’d given her to calm her down. Chugging it back and swallowing it with a large gulp from her bottled water, she waited for the drug to take effect. It was the only way she could think about him. About how his mom must be feeling.
Holly allowed her mind to play over the last few moments in the bathroom. When he’d looked her in the eye, and turned abruptly, tearing his way out of the house. Out into the street. Where he’d arched and spasmed, and then run off into the darkness, tearing at his own body with his hands. How she’d stayed inside, locked the door, and grabbed a hammer. Just in case. Just in case he came back.
He’d been shot by authorities sometime later. She only knew that because she had asked relentlessly for days. Finally, one of the officers had remembered him. Had shot a Changed person only a few blocks from Miranda’s home. She’d identified the photo. Given them a first name and college to start their search. Apparently his hands, like many, had been too mangled for clear prints.
She thunked her head against the window, pushing back the thoughts of what he must have gone through. How scared he must have been. It wasn’t fair. Nothing here was fair. He had a plan. A life. A mom that needed him, exactly how he was. How was he the one who had Changed in their group?
A “Changed” person, or “The Changed” is what people were saying. She guessed “infected” or “zombies” brought the idea of the apocalypse to too many people’s minds. People were panicked enough as it was. After all of the testing, they still didn’t know where the virus had originated. It just seemed to burst into being all around the world, almost simultaneously. At least they knew it didn’t seem to have… what had they called it? Cross species something. Holl
y shook her head. Stupid to care so much about terminology. It didn’t spread to animals, they’d determined. Luckily, it seemed to not be affecting other humans either.
They’d found small traces of the virus in their blood. The way the doctor’s explained it, it seemed to be dormant. That’s why they wanted frequent blood tests. To track the levels. To study the way the body reacted. Nobody else had gone wild yet. Not since those two long nights. Thank God. With how crowded the tenting and hospitals were, it would have been a massacre.
As it was, they couldn’t maintain the little isolation camps forever. They’d determined quickly enough that it was not spread by air, or by saliva. So, after almost a month, they started sending people home. The news had stated the outbreak was costing the government millions of dollars in containment and clean up.
Holly tugged the neckline of her tee shirt up and away, fanning her chest. Maybe it was the early summer sun slanting into the window. Or maybe they were actually heating the train this time around. Either way, she wished she’d worn shorts instead of her jeans.
Her eyes still felt raw and sore from her long goodbye with her Aunt Miranda, and even June. The prickly waitress had been a good companion during the containment. Her sarcasm and take no crap attitude had contrasted well with Aunty Mir’s optimism. She’d tried to convince Miranda to come home with her. Just for a visit. She’d said she’d come up soon. She had a lot of paperwork to file for insurance on the restaurant. She wanted to file a police report on the break in and the murders now that she had been freed from medical. Her aunt had held Holly close and they’d sobbed their goodbyes, with Miranda promising she’d come visit just as soon as she could.
Holly swept her hair up into a ponytail, fanning her cheeks. Must just be all of the emotions. She felt like a kettle about to boil over. Her cheap gas station cell phone bleeped with a text message. Only her parents, June, and her aunt had this number. She wasn’t ready to face Joanie or their other friends yet.
Can’t wait to see you, honey. Her mom. She felt a small smile tug at the corners of her mouth. She actually couldn’t wait to see her either. She was more than ready to have that talk her aunt had recommended.
Can’t wait to see you either. I love you both. She tapped back before shoving her phone into her backpack and leaning back in the chair. She tried to ignore the bead of sweat rolling down her hairline.
The End
Thank you for reading! Flip the page to start “Wilders” set approximately a decade later, with a new set of characters!
Volume Two
Wilders
Chapter One
“No, you can’t go outside.” Renna leaned down to run her hand up her cat’s belly as he stretched his paws up toward the handle of the sliding door. “I know you think it’s more fun out there, but a sweet little guy like you would be Wilder fodder in less than a day.”
”Merrrow?” Tim Tam tilted his head at her, insistently pawing at the door. Renna wished her brother had never started taking the cat out to sit in the sun with him on afternoons that he sketched in their backyard. Benjamin insisted that it was harmless. Everyone knew that full sun was the safest you could be these days; safer even than locked doors and shuttered windows.
Eyeing the dappled golden rays slanting through the tree line Renna sighed, “Fine, Timmy Tammy but only for five minutes, okay?” She held up her hand, all fingers spread and danced it in front of his face as if he would better understand that she would only allow a brief dip outside well before the sun set. When her brother Benjamin, or as he was called by his band groupies, Jammin, took Tim Tam out he usually sat in the garden enclosed with small hole chicken wire, so the fluffy cat couldn’t dart off into the neighboring woods.
Reaching for the collar and leash, Renna spoke sternly to the cat who stared intently out the door, ignoring her lecture. “Timmy, you cannot possibly think that this will become a habit. It’s bad enough that Jammin,” she rolled her eyes at the nickname, “takes you out almost every day. You used to be such a content house cat before he started doing that. You would watch the birds for hours, then curl up and sleep.” She clicked the collar around his neck, the blue barely visible through the mass of smoke colored fur.
“And don’t think that just because I am talking to you like you’re a person that you get to make the decisions around here. You are a cat. C-A-T. You should just be grateful we give you wet food and not that dry kibble stuff.” Once she’d clipped the leash in place, she carefully lifted the bar that jammed the sliding glass door shut, then unclicked the flimsy handle lock, and slid the well-oiled door back.
They’d had a screen door when she was younger, before the change began, but now they had a stronger copper threaded slider. At first, she had loved to look at the shining copper threads in the sunlight, her five year old self pretending it meant she was rich and lived in a castle. Now the slider was oxidized and covered in green, the concrete slab below it stained with a puddle of run off.
“Yeah, buddy, I can see why you want to go out. You can hardly see the birds anymore through this mess.” The slats in the mesh were only slightly closer together than the chicken wire around the garden, but the crusty green wasn’t a pretty view. Not like the story book view of the woods stretching out behind them. When he was still alive, her father had always said that it was worth being house poor to have a yard that abutted an enormous state owned forest.
Looking carefully to both sides, Renna stepped out of the house with the large cat at her side, briskly walking over to the garden and unlatching the wire door. Once they were inside she released the handle of the leash, latching the door behind her. She plopped down on a log lining the squash patch to wait the cat out. This garden was the final remnant of her father. She usually avoided it. She hated seeing Benjamin sitting out here for hours. The garden was just another reminder that now all their mother saw when she looked at her was the role Renna had played in her own father’s death. Benjamin swore he understood and that he would have done the same thing. But she knew that some part of him had to resent her. She was the reason he’d grown up without a father. That they both had.
The distant sound of her cell phone ringing inside snapped her from her forlorn thoughts. She rose, shaking the cobwebs of bad memories from her head and glanced around for the cat. Tim Tam was sitting at the edge of the fencing near the woods, staring intently out.
“Timmy Tammy, come on! Time to go.” She sing-songed to him. He didn’t even cock an ear in her direction, his gaze never wavering. As Renna studied the alert posture of the cat she began to feel like an idiot for coming out. Everyone knew that only the stupid danced with dusk. Late afternoon sun was nowhere near as safe as midday sun. Standing a few feet behind the intent cat, Renna stilled and raked her gaze along the tree line. She listened intently for the sound of branches breaking, of pounding foot falls. All she could hear was her pounding heart.
“Tim Tam!” She hissed, sweeping an arm down for the end of the leash without removing her gaze from the forest, “let’s go.” As she tugged two quick jerks on the leash the cat skittered over to her feet and waited, all coiled muscles tense and ready to run as she fumbled with the latch holding the fencing closed. After pushing the door open she darted out, sprinting the few feet to the concrete slab. The cat easily outpaced her to the doorstep.
“Shit! The fencing.” She started to turn back. If she didn’t re-latch the chicken wire, half of Benjamin’s vegetables would be eaten by wildlife before the sun rose high enough for her to return and latch it. An ominous growl curling out of Tim Tam stopped her short. His back was arched and fur puffed out to make him look even larger than his 28lbs. The hairs on her arms and neck were all standing up. “Shit!” She dove into the house, reeling the cat in forcefully by the leash, and slamming the crusty green copper door shut, followed by the glass door. She flicked the flimsy latch down and dove for the bar that kept the door from being able to slide. Panting, she pressed her face to the door, peering through the grati
ng. She swore she could feel eyes looking back at her from the forest.
The yard was clear and there was no movement in the treeline. Tim Tam slunk slowly away from the door and promptly began licking his paws. “Some help you are.” Renna muttered, still breathing hard and watching carefully out into the yard. “I bet you got me all scared for nothing,” she accused the cat. There was no sign of anything in the yard; not a Wilder, not a neighbor, not even a deer peeking around a tree.
With a sigh Renna debated the wisdom of going back out to latch the fence. The chances of anything being out there but not being baited into coming after her and the cat were very slim. Wilders weren’t known for stealth or patience. The very name came from the crazy and wild behavior, like the berserkers from lore. They were unstoppable, stronger than a human should be, and unflinching to pain.
When the changing first began people were terrified. They thought the world was ending and that things would go the way of zombie movies, with only small pockets of survivors. But this wasn’t the same. The spread of the infection was less virulent and more avoidable. Now, almost a decade later, people had done what they did best - adapted. Adapted to a life behind copper or silver screens, a life lived only in the daylight, with all darkened hours spent safely locked away.
The government had provided each household with one copper screen per window and door after the outbreak. Upgrading from the sickly green and malleable copper to fine silver was the new status symbol for the wealthy. While the American government, and subsequently all other major governments, claimed they were not responsible for the outbreak, they had known how to fend against it awfully quickly. Or at least that’s what Renna’s Mom muttered at least once a month over the newspaper. Three things worked as a barrier to the Wilders. Most of the time. The first was metal with high conductivity, like silver and copper. The second was electricity. The third was sunlight. None of them killed them. It wasn’t like in stories when vampires went into the sun and caught flame. It was more of an aversion. Like when a person stepped into almost scalding water. It hurt. You moved. You did not stay touching it long enough that it could slowly kill you. That’s how Wilders reacted to the three things.