Cage The Dead

by Gary F. Vanucci

  “Not necessarily, but I get your point,” Nick interjected.

  “Exactly. Either way, it was our goal at the time. Needless to say, it was devastating to the both of us. We both wanted kids. A few weeks later, Adam and I discussed our future, him understanding that I couldn’t bear his children or carry on his name, which hit us hard, not to mention his family.” She stood, stretched and downed the rest of the glass of wine before sitting again and pouring herself another glass.

  “And yet, the man gave up his need for having a family—children of his own flesh and blood!—to love me!”

  “That’s pretty heavy,” Nick mentioned, staring back at her intently.

  “That, my friend, does not even begin to describe Adam’s selflessness. Anyway,” she added, sipping her wine, “the man was willing to give up everything just to be with me….”

  Long silence ensued as the two exchanged glances and sips of wine. Gaia glanced over at Justin who was still sleeping, and refilled her glass once more, enjoying the taste of the wine.

  “That explains your affection toward the apes and their babies, right? Transference or some shit, am I right?”

  “Something like that, sure.”

  “You're the psychology buff, not me,” Nick said, crossing and uncrossing his legs.

  “Yes. I am sure there is a lingering need to nurture in there, if I was to break it down. But, what about you, man? You mentioned your dad on occasion, never told me why he and your mom split. You wanna get that off your chest?”

  “Maybe,” he admitted with a deep sigh. “But who let the cats out of their pens? Never mind…. Anyway, my dad was a good man from what I can remember early on. He took me to ball games, coached me in sports, all that kind of shit. But, when I was a teenager, he began to disappear for long periods of time.”

  “Lemme guess. An affair?”

  “Not that simple. No, he would go off on hunting trips,” Nick said, as Gaia raised her eyebrows in disbelief.

  “Are you fuckin’ kiddin’ me?!”

  “Right?”

  “You gotta be jokin’! Your mom’s family is all about—“

  “Yeah, I know. He went the other way with that. And not only that, he even brought me along on a few of ‘em. I didn’t have the heart to tell my mom and I was too stupid to tell my dad to go to hell. No, he had me convinced that it was okay. But, I figured out when I shot my first and only deer. I didn’t feel so good after that, you know, hunting defenseless animals. I know people do it, and that’s whatever…but it wasn’t for me. So, not too much longer, my mom caught wind of it and, well…you can guess what happened then.”

  “Divorce, I’d say,” she said draining her glass.

  “Ding—ding—ding! Give that lady a prize!” Nick yelped, causing Justin to shift in his chair. Gaia placed her finger over her mouth to quiet Nick, who chuckled at his lack of manners in the moment. “Look, you asked, Gaia. I’m just relaying the sad story.”

  “But, you found a love of animals in that gloomy life that your father wanted for you, right? You could have chosen to be like him, but you didn’t. You don’t have that kind of heart, do you?” she asked rhetorically. “No, instead you found a deep love for animals and ended up making your mother proud. And me.”

  “I’d like to…think so,” he said, wincing at the obvious pain in his shoulder. He removed his jacket and placed it on the back of the chair and folded his arms over his chest. He got up and began looking through the cupboards and in the refrigerator and closed the door, staring up at Maye, who sat there quietly, playing with something up there. “Gaia, there isn’t as much dry food here as I thought.”

  “We could take the arm, Nick,” Gaia said with a lack of confidence, causing Nick to laugh again, ignoring his bleak statement about the food. Gaia couldn’t deal with it right now.

  “I’d fuckin’ bleed out, Gaia. You're no doctor! C‘mon!” he barked angrily, Gaia recoiling under his cruelty in the moment and understanding that he would probably just die from blood loss instead.

  A few long moments of silence passed and Nick drained the wine and poured himself another. “Oh, and I'm not sure if you know it, but there is a backup generator in the basement underneath the lab. If you lose power, there’s a few fifty gallon drums of fuel down there to keep the lab, freezers and house going for a while. And you know the gas station is not far away either, if things get…desperate.”

  “I’ve heard about the generator. I’m hoping the freezers keep.”

  “Me too. But judging by the amount of animals that are roaming free, you won’t have to feed many of them.” Nick cut away the cotton fabric of his shirt from around the infection and stared at the inflammation and discoloration that surrounded the wounded area. He winced and began to weep, apparently accepting his bitter fate. “This is it.”

  She nodded and stared at him intensely. He blinked and drew in a breath. “You need…you need to kill me. I am too much of a pussy to do it myself, Gaia. Please…,” he said, falling out of his chair and spilling his wine. She could not believe that this was happening.

  Maye chirped from the windowsill at hearing the crash and hid on top of the refrigerator, while Justin’s head shot up, his eyes wide.

  “What happened?!” the boy asked, standing up and staring at Nick on the ground.

  “Back away, honey,” Gaia cautioned, unsure if Nick were past the point of no return, or if he was simply overwhelmed by fever. She hoped for the latter.

  She swallowed hard, thinking of how she could put the man down in a humane way, but nothing at all came to mind. Her heart raced and the room spun, her emotions getting the better of her.

  “What—“

  “Go!” Gaia cried out loudly, stealing a glance at the boy and knowing he had no clue as to what he should be doing. She removed her machete and stared at it, thinking it too harsh to use on her friend.

  Glass shattered from behind her and she spun to face the source. A zombie was trying to climb through the window in the kitchen above the sink. The zombie’s flesh was carved away by the remaining glass in the window frame, but it did not care. It advanced indifferently, pulling itself through the window toward them.

  Gaia could not let the creature inside and so she rushed toward the sink and raised the machete high with two hands, bringing the blade edge down upon the zombie’s skull, stopping it clean. Another pair of hands, and then another, began to breach the open area where once a pane of glass stood.

  They needed to be silenced, else more would come, she knew. Grasping the handle of the machete again, she shoved the tip through the pair of zombies, whose corpses now blocked the window.

  “Gaia, the safe. Get…the guns. Now!” Nick said as firmly as his weakened voice would allow. Gaia took in a deep breath and ran to the basement door right next to the kitchen, swung the door wide and flicked on the lights. Moaning and snarling ensued.

  Something was downstairs.

  The sounds of footsteps and groaning grew louder and a figure hit the bottom of the stairs and tried to climb them to get to her position. Gaia retracted her foot from the first step, grabbed the keys and waited for the thing to navigate the stairs. Half a minute later, it was there and she slammed the door in the creature’s face. The sounds of loud thuds and crashing ensued. Gaia grinned ever so briefly, imagining the spectacle of a zombie tumbling down the stairs, and flung the door wide, pocketing the keys.

  The zombie—a young boy not all that long ago—lay on its back, its head sitting at a right angle that almost had Gaia vomiting. She held it back, raced down the stairs and jammed the blade through the zombie’s forehead. The blade hit the cement floor quite easily as the zombie’s skull did not offer as much resistance as she’d initially thought.

  She stood and looked around, seeing a lot of what looked to be antique furniture and old pottery and glasses, even fine china piled up on tables and in good shape. One table and its belongings were shattered. The window above was open wide with no window or screen. This ha
d to have been where the zombie had entered the cellar. Gaia quickly made it to the window, peered out and saw more undead creatures in the distance, though they hadn’t seen her or noted the opening. It was small, too, she noted, but this one had gotten in and more still might.

  Gaia looked around and saw an air conditioner on the floor that looked as if it were meant for that window. She took a step forward and then heard a creaking sound behind her. She reached for her machete, wrapped her fingers around the handle, and slid it out.

  She slowly craned her neck to see the source of the sound and saw Justin standing still on the third step. Maye sat quietly on his shoulder, her tail wrapped about his neck. Gaia sighed and slid the machete back in place. She was so focused on the zombie that she hadn’t even noticed that the boy wasn’t beside her.

  “C’mon! Help me get this in the window!” Gaia barked as Justin met her at the base of the window, grasping the opposite side of the air conditioner. The pair lifted the thing up and slid it into the opening perfectly.

  “Good job, high-five,” she congratulated, holding up an open palm. The boy excitedly obliged her.

  She studied the basement area and found what had to be the gun safe. She removed the keys from her pocket, made her way there and fitted the key in the lock. She turned the key and opened the door wide, seeing three rifles and a few more hard shell plastic cases on a shelf at the top. She had no idea what kind of guns they were, but she knew she would have to figure it out on her own.

  Gaia quickly inspected the first of the cases, knowing that they would be pistols. She did not want to try dealing with a rifle right away and instead opened the first case. It was a gun that appeared to be fairly old with a handful of loose shells inside. The second one was another six-shooter, but much bigger.

  “Too much kick,” she mumbled, closing the case.

  Then she heard movement upstairs and swallowed through a suddenly constricted throat.

  “Shit!” she whispered sharply, grasping a third and opening it. Gaia opened the hard shell case and saw a modern looking pistol that appeared very similar to the one Adam had purchased a few years past. It was something in the semi-automatic family she recognized immediately. She hefted the gun, trying to recall the topics that Adam had forced her to remember and trying to get a feel for the weight.

  She had, on occasion, gone to the firing range with him. On one particular occasion, Gaia remembered spending a few hours there with him—after normal business hours, as Adam was good friends with a man who worked there, and he owed Adam a favor. She recalled how he patiently showed her so many ways about firing a weapon responsibly. He made her go over things forward and back again, working the safety, changing clips, chambering bullets, and so on

  It was all lost to her in this very moment.

  She couldn’t remember anything at all!

  It was then that a shadow appeared in the doorway, casting the stairwell in gloom.

  And then she saw a familiar boot come to rest on the top step. Her heart sank, as she knew what was coming for them.

  Chapter 9

  Suddenly, all the training that Adam had taught Gaia about guns came rushing back to her. She inspected the gun, switched off the safety and pointed it toward the stairwell.

  A loud crash ensued as the zombie, her former friend, Nick, tumbled down the steps. When he hit the bottom, his right arm below the elbow was hanging at a very peculiar angle, clearly snapped at the joint, as the undead creature clumsily regained its footing.

  “Get behind me,” she said to Justin, keeping her eyes on the zombie, as the boy did just that, hiding behind Gaia.

  She pointed the gun, held her arm steady, and waited.

  The Nick-zombie began to run toward her and she fired.

  A loud sound rang out in the area, echoing throughout the basement. And then, the distinct sound of a body slumping to the cement floor followed.

  Gaia covered her mouth in disbelief. It had all happened too fast. She could not believe that this undead creature slumped on the floor before her was only a few moments ago, chatting with her about their respective lives, as well as someone she’d recently considered both a friend and colleague.

  “What should we do with him, Miss Gaia?” asked Justin, startling Gaia from her reveries.

  “Well, I’d like to bury him,” she said, thinking about how difficult a task that would be, considering that the grounds outside were complete with both animal and the living dead wandering about. One of the two scenarios would make the task difficult, let alone both. “But I am not sure what we can do right now.”

  “We should definitely bury him. He was really nice to me,” Justin said, trying to stem the flow of tears. Gaia actually admired his mask of bravery and courage, perhaps not wanting to cry in front of Gaia for fear of her getting upset. Whatever it was, the boy was showing valor well beyond his years for sure.

  “Well, for now we’ll wrap his body in something and put him out back,” Gaia reasoned, more for her own sake than the boy’s. She surveyed the basement, spotting excess chicken feed, crates of supplies, including some fruits, lending credence to Nick’s earlier assertions. And that perhaps this excess food had been dumped in here because it didn’t fit in their appointed spaces in the storage shed and freezers outside. She was pretty sure she’d overheard some of the staff mentioning that in the recent past, though until now, it was nothing on her radar.

  “What about this, Miss Gaia?” Justin asked, holding up an opaque cover of some kind that when she inspected, was a plastic sheet for protection against rain. She quickly removed a few items and personal effects from Nick’s body, including his wallet, keys, jewelry and binoculars that hung around his neck. Then she and Justin went about wrapping Nick’s body in the plastic cover and the two of them went about taking the body upstairs. Several minutes later, Gaia and Justin had the body upstairs and the pair took a moment to catch their breath.

  “That was…a lot harder…than it looked,” Gaia said, doubled over, hands on her knees. “So much for being in shape.”

  Justin simply shrugged, clearly not catching her sarcasm. It was then that she gave thought to the boy. He was quite big for a nine year old and seemed stronger than most boys she’d ever seen. As a matter of fact, she wondered if he really was older and didn’t even know.

  “Okay, let’s just drag the body near the door,” she said, pushing those thoughts away for another time and gesturing to an open area in the foyer. They did just that, the two of them dragging the body in unison to the designated area.

  “What kind of gun is that?” Justin asked out of the blue. “I’m not sure, honey. It’s got writing in French here,” she said, squinting at the words, but she was unable to read them clearly under their current lighting. “Fabrique Nationale, something or another. Anyway, what I do know is that there are,” she paused and ejected the clip, “thirteen rounds in this clip, which should be more than enough bullets I would hope.”

  She looked all around and realized that they hadn’t really explored the house except for the long hall that leads all the way through the first level. There was an upstairs, too. But, in her estimation, that gunshot should have attracted any lingering zombies that remained in the house toward the sound.

  “Will you teach me how to shoot it?” he asked with excitement in his eyes.

  “I don’t see why not. But first, we need to assess our situation and see what the area outside is like.” She paused, thinking of a way to try to explain getting to see Solomon and the gorillas that were still outside in the pen on the far end of the zoo grounds. “Hey, Justin. I have a good friend who‘s a gorilla. Friends, really,” she said, emphasizing the plural, “a whole family of gorillas. “And I really need to go check on them all. There are babies there that may need some help. You wanna come with me?”

  “Sure,” he said with a nod.

  “All right, then. Let’s see what the food situation is first,” she said, heading into the kitchen and checking the pantry. G
aia methodically went over the food in the cupboards, which seemed to be quite a bit, and in the refrigerator, which again seemed to be a bit of overflow as there was some frozen food in there—some that could be for people and some not so much meant for human consumption—that she could see.

  There were a good deal of preserved foods like noodles, protein bars and whatnot, which Gaia attributed to the staff or the help stashing for their own uses, along with some things that hadn’t been removed since Charles’s death. And Kristen was good that way, allowing the staff to store food, as long as they cleaned it out whenever appropriate.

  “I need to check the upstairs, okay hon? After that, we can go visit the gorillas,” Gaia instructed. Then she scanned the area, seeing Maye sitting atop the refrigerator still. “Grab that banana in the fruit bowl and give it to Maye. She’ll love you forever.” Justin smiled back at her and did as he was bid. “Now you stay here. I’ll be back.”

  Gaia crept away and scanned the entire lower level. The living room, den, storage closets, and lower level bedrooms were unscathed. After securing the lower level, she checked the pistol again, making sure that there was a bullet in the chamber, and took her first step up the stairwell.

  As soon as she stepped onto the first of the stairs, it creaked, and she flinched at the noise, almost firing the gun into the wooden step.

  She began to slowly ascend the stairs. Several moments later, sweat beading on her forehead, she made it to the second floor landing. She took a deep breath to steady herself again, wiped the sweat from her palms, refitted the gun in her hand, and began down the long hallway. Every other step she took provoked a creaking sound from the floor.