Swarm (Dead Ends)

by G. D. Lang

  What’s that old saying about thanking God for unanswered prayers? I call bullshit on that. Why does nobody ever blame God for the bad shit? We’re so quick to praise him when good things happen yet so unwilling to implicate him when life hands us lemons and we forget the recipe for lemonade. Just once I want to see a professional athlete throw God under the bus for missing the winning field goal or striking out with the game on the line. While we’re at it let’s blame him for cancer and war. Politicians and the Kardashians. Because surely an entity capable of such amazing feats as turning water into wine could also be capable of turning a canyon of gold into an unending river of feces. The current condition of a good deal of the population should be evidence enough for that. So of course my prayer of hoping to get a few hours of shuteye without being sleep-raped or served up as the main course in a flesh buffet went unanswered. So fuck you God, fuck you right in the ear.

  This time the dream was more like some kind of creepy Unsolved Mysteries reenactment of my initial encounter with Jim Bob complete with foggy-lens visuals and an old gravelly voice narrating the horror play by play. And I swear I could just faintly hear the Cranberries song “Zombie” playing in the background. Just the kind of tacky nuance that fans of that show would have loved. Everything seemed to be amplified to ridiculous levels as if the sound guy decided to let his kid play with the dials for a while. And the worst part was that I knew exactly what was going to happen and I could do nothing to stop it. And just like the traffic cams cycling through on the television, the whole dream just repeated itself over and over.

  The part where Jim Bob was attempting to pry me out of the back of my car legs first was playing for what seemed like the fifth time. The pressure on my legs as he attempted to pry them free with or without my upper body attached to them was so real. I could feel the pain and fear all over again. Just as the tugging stopped, I finally broke out of the dream, dreary-eyed and drenched with sweat. I confusedly looked to the television which was still on but now on the floor, with its soft light illuminating the ceiling of the bunker as if someone had pulled it by the power cord until it crashed to the ground.

  I wondered as I glanced down at Jane if this was one of those “dream within a dream” situations like they do in movies to manufacture a cheap scare from the audience but this was too real, too immediate to be happening in my head. Jane’s body felt limp as I tried to shake her awake. Her head fell unnaturally backwards and that’s when I saw it. A series of small bite marks peppered her face and a much larger wound in her neck – no doubt the one that now left her lifeless body draped over me – oozed with blood as her heart pumped its last few beats. Suddenly it all made sense. A moment of sobering clarity overtook me in waves. The exposed piece of bloodied metal on the Jeep. Zoe’s cut and ensuing flu-like sickness. The blood on the Jeep was diseased and Zoe’s open wound was exposed to it. She was infected though not directly which I’m assuming is why it took her so long to turn. The booze and drugs in my system fought neck and neck with the excess of adrenaline now boiling to the surface and I tried hard to keep my focus through the haze. I looked to the bed but didn’t see Zoe there. Then I felt it. No doubt the reason my dream and the intensity of Jim Bob’s pulling felt so real. Zoe was at the foot of my sleeping bag, her face covered with blood and sinew, trying mightily to chew through my sleeping bag and into my feet.

  Thankfully, after the rattlesnake incident I had been reluctant to take off my boots for any reason. Amazingly or perhaps terrifyingly, the little terror was already through the sleeping bag and working hard on the outer layer of my boot. Half of me wanted to see what she would do once she got to the steel toe but the other half, the smarter half, kicked the formerly sweet little girl in the face so hard that her body went flying back into one of the makeshift walls, sending a cloud of dirt into the air. I struggled to push Jane’s corpse off of me – giving a whole new meaning to the term dead weight – and unzip the sleeping bag before that little undead shit got her bearings back. Which I knew from experience with these things didn’t take very long. And of course the zipper to the sleeping bag decided to stick. I don’t think I’ve ever owned a sleeping bag in my life that featured a zipper that could work seamlessly in any environment. No matter what kind of magic you tried to work with your fingers, it was a guarantee that eventually, unavoidably, fabric and zipper would become one. Ten times out of ten, you could fucking count on it.

  I did my best to shimmy out of the bag as best as I could, managing to just get my feet out as Zoe, or something like her, charged at me once again. I kept my eyes on her, coiling my legs to prepare to kick her once more as I searched frantically with my hand for my machete. I managed to just find the handle as she descended on me screeching and foaming at the mouth. Looking into her eyes confirmed that any sense of who she was, who she would never be again, was gone. For a child, her unwavering strength and surprising speed were horrifying. It occurred to me that with their young bodies and pliable bones and tendons, children of the undead variety might be even more dangerous than adults, if for no other reason than the still living would underestimate them or perhaps think twice before killing them, letting the innocence of youth fool them into thinking there must be some other way. But as I raised the blade of the machete and plunged it into her abdomen I assured myself that there was no helping this animal. The instant the virus took hold, she ceased being human. She was no longer anything worth saving.

  I knew the blade to her abdomen wouldn’t kill her. In fact, other than the restriction of her movement, she barely noticed it. But it did give me control over where she could go while I found the crossbow and ended this nightmare. I leveled it to her head and paused momentarily, almost mesmerized by her eyes. The sight of shattered irises, dilated pupils, and the outer white part turning a darker and darker shade of yellow with each passing second just wasn’t something I felt like I would get used to seeing anytime soon. The blood and the biting and all of that were no problem but every time I saw one these things’ eyes up close, a chill ran down my spine. I snapped out of it quickly when I was almost sure I felt Jane’s body move slightly. I pulled the trigger and nothing happened. I rolled my eyes with anger once again – a common occurrence whenever I seemed to have this goddamn thing in my hands – clicked the safety and pulled the trigger. A momentary look of confusion gave way to instant death, or re-death, whatever the hell some scientist in a lab somewhere will end up calling it one day. The eerie light in her eyes faded and her body went limp, her entire weight pushing down on the machete resting tightly in my left hand. My shoulder burned with intensity as I gingerly threw her body off to the side and immediately switched my attention to Jane’s corpse.

  She rested peacefully on her back, still looking as beautiful in death as she did in life, as long as you ignored the exposed flesh, oozing neck wound, and blackish red sludge now encompassing every artery and vein in her body. I shook my head as I looked at her, wondering what could’ve been had we met under any other circumstances. In the end, she’ll just end up being the one that got away, though the reasons for that will no doubt be a lot different than the normal sob stories dutifully listened to by bartenders the world over long after happy hour has ended and nothing but the true drinking veterans remain.

  Her body stirred suddenly before going limp again. I gently pulled the machete from Zoe’s corpse and focused the sharp tip on Jane’s temple. I contemplated waiting for some unknown reason but there just didn’t seem to be a point to that course of action, or inaction I suppose. The result would be the same either way. The cure, if there even was one, wouldn’t be found in this bunker. I stood above her head and prepared to plunge the blade into her temple before she turned but at the last second I hesitated, as any sane human would do when faced with killing a member of their own species. That was enough for her body to jerk and her eyes to open. But before she, or it, could acclimate I forced the blade deep into her head and out the other side to the point where it stuck into the ground and sta
yed there. Her body went limp and the job was done.

  I surveyed the scene as the haze began to come back in full force. I shook my head, put the TV back up on the stand, and walked towards the bed, making sure to strip the sheets and drape them over the bodies. After that was done I barely made it back to the bed before collapsing into a comatose exhaustion, my mind going blank and body going limp before I managed to get fully onto the bed. The horror was over for now. At least this particular episode anyway. To be continued, I suppose.

  Chapter 15

  I awoke into the oddly comforting familiarity of pain and befuddlement, my cheek buried into the cold dirt of the bunker floor. Though it had been my initial goal last night, I wasn’t sure if I had ever made it to the bed. I stood upright and stretched, my knuckles rapping the top of the bunker as every bone in my body seemed to crack in unison. The bodies still rested where they came to a halt last night. At least I think they did. But they weren’t moving, which was the most important aspect of them. The bunker smelled sour and metallic, as if a handful of loose change were directly in front of my nose. Any thought of staying here, glued to the television and shitting mere feet from where I ate while I witnessed the world die, was squashed. There was no way I’d manage to haul those bodies out of here with the condition of my shoulder, not to mention just about every other muscle, tendon, and ligament in my body. The severity of the situation, of this place, of what my world was devolving into started to manifest itself. I felt like an imaginary vice had me in its grip with one end teetering over my head, the other placed just below my feet. The unseen handle tightening with each new day that I survived and the others around me perished. Why was I so lucky? Why had I survived and the others around me had not? Was it even luck to begin with or did fate have a hand in all of this? Or maybe after telling God to go fuck himself, I was reaping what I sowed.

  I needed a task to focus on and I needed it quick. And considering it was overdue time to move on from this hellhole, I thought it would be a good idea to gather any supplies I could use and load them up in the Jeep so I could be on my way to the coast. I’m by myself once more so I guess I’d gotten my wish in the end. Although I can’t say I’m too enthused about the way it happened. But mourning the dead would do nothing but put me in an even shittier mood than I’m already in, not to mention put my guard down while the remaining undead were still roaming around looking for fresh recruits.

  I loaded a pillow case with all of the canned food I could find, save for one can of corned beef hash which I planned to make for breakfast after I had everything loaded. All of the freeze dried meals went into a backpack, along with some eating utensils, batteries, a few walkie-talkies, and all of the booze that would fit. I told myself the alcohol would be for sterilizing wounds or disinfecting silverware but I knew what it was really for. The sober thing just doesn’t work for me so I decided the prudent thing would be to simply stop fighting it. It’s not like I’ll be alive long enough to worry about cirrhosis of the liver or cancer or some other shit like that. My death would most likely be bloody and gruesome but at least it would be quick. That’s the hope anyway. I’d take that over wasting away in a hospital bed any day. I’d have to make several trips in order to take the pallets of Gatorade and the rest of the supplies but the effort would be well worth it. With the Jeep now only having a single occupant, I could stuff quite a bit more supplies into the front and back seats. Not really knowing the rules when it comes to packing for an apocalypse, I figured a hoarding mentality would be better than a minimalist one, though I couldn’t really form a reasonable explanation for why. I suppose it’s because stuff makes me comfortable, allows me to think I could survive for a long time even if I were forced to live in the Jeep for the foreseeable future. Hiking through the forest with nothing but a blade and a Clif Bar just wasn’t my style. Once boredom set in, that Clif Bar wouldn’t stand a chance. Then I’d really be fucked.

  I tightened my boots, taking a long look at the bite mark that Zoe left in the left one. Upon closer inspection I could actually see a fragment of a tooth still lodged into the steel toe. If she had been given another minute, I think she would’ve been able to pierce it altogether. I thought briefly about prying it out but figured it should stay there as a constant reminder of just how fucked up things can get in a very small amount of time when you forget to pay attention to details. Details like Zoe cutting herself on a bloodied piece of metal and then falling ill. I should’ve seen it but there was just too much going on. Too many variables. So much information to process at once that it just slipped right through the filter. And I almost died because of it. I shook my head as I sheathed my machete and prepared to make the short hike back to the Jeep. When I first realized this bunker existed, I imagined staying put here for as long as it took, maybe let the world get its equilibrium back. Now, I couldn’t get out of here fast enough.

  The pillowcase full of canned goods was starting to get heavy fast and I mentally scolded myself for not thinking to put the cans into the backpack – which was filled mostly with paper light freeze-dried food and resting comfortably on my shoulder – while filling the thing that wasn’t meant to carry anything at all with the light stuff. I chuckled to myself as I wondered how many people who deemed themselves to be “survivalists” had already perished while my dumb ass just keeps bumbling along, doing one moronic thing after another. It’s one thing to simply be stupid. Procreation is nothing if not a crapshoot. But it’s almost worse to be just smart enough to know that you keep doing stupid things over and over again without ever really making a conscious effort to fix the problem. But I suppose my being alive meant there was no use messing with the order of things now. I shook it off and decided to just enjoy the blanketed calm of the forest as I took what I almost managed to convince myself was just a nice normal morning stroll.

  I looked over in the direction of the marijuana field that had taken Ricky’s life. A simplistic mixture of soil and seed that had ensured the swift and methodical destruction of our not so merry little band of survivors. Suddenly I was reminded of the whole reason we were even up here in the first place. The ranger’s tower. The news report had given us a grim idea that the Puget Sound had definitely been lost but it didn’t give any indication about whether there would be rescue missions or survivor camps or anything. Though I’m certain this wasn’t quite on the list of disasters that FEMA was set up to handle so I didn’t hold out much hope for any of that. I still wanted to get up there and see if maybe there was some kind of emergency broadcast or something that would give me any idea whether trekking towards the coast would even be a possibility. I had the feeling though that I’d be attempting to get there regardless of what any report might have to say.

  Just as I turned my body in the direction of the path to the tower, I heard a twig snap in the distance behind me. It might as well have been a gunshot. The sound pierced through the silence, immediately spiking the hairs on my neck. The pillowcase dropped to the ground, causing the cans to emit a cacophony of unwanted sounds; a low budget dollar store orchestra that reverberated off of every available surface. I fumbled for my machete as I quickly turned around. I wasn’t quite prepared for what came next. It was a deer. A young male from the looks of the barely formed antlers on the top of its head. We both looked at one another. It looking at me trying to assess my danger level, maybe wondering if I was one of the undead, me looking at it, getting lost in the moment of seeing something so beautiful and graceful littered amongst the fear, death, and (I couldn’t help but think) inevitable destruction of this beautiful land. I could hear another rustling noise further in the distance and a second later I detected movement from a bush behind the deer. I expected to maybe see his mate or perhaps some siblings following him to wherever they may be headed. Instead what I saw was something I couldn’t quite comprehend or perhaps didn’t want to believe.

  A zombie, unlike any I had yet seen, came rushing out of the brush at breakneck speed. The deer, no doubt distracted by m
y presence, got a late start before it began to run from this abomination. It gained ground on the deer so quickly I could do nothing but watch in horror. The zombie dug its graying, bloodied fingers into the sides of the deer’s hind legs and threw it to the ground in a horrifying display of strength and agility. It immediately began chewing on the deer’s lower leg as if it were making a calculated decision to ensure the deer couldn’t escape. In no time, it had gnawed off one of its feet and made a quick move towards its throat. The whole scene looked eerily similar to a Cheetah taking down a gazelle and the grim realization of what that meant literally took my breath away.

  I instinctively tightened my grip on the machete, swaying slightly to one side as my mind tried to wrestle with the reality laid out before it, a reality it must now find some way to cope with if I wanted any chance of getting out of this alive. I stepped to one side to right my balance which placed my foot directly into the pillow case full of canned food. I winced as the sound echoed off the trees and through the leaves until it inevitably reached the ears of what I was certain would be my undoing. I stood board straight as it looked up at me with what looked like a major artery hanging out of its mouth, the blood still draining from one end. My mind clung stubbornly, stupidly, to the Jurassic Park T-Rex theory that if I didn’t move, it couldn’t see me. It was admittedly the longest of long shots but it was all I had. My brain was toast. Pop culture science was all I had left.