by RWK Clark
“I’m not going to argue with you,” the captain reiterated. “I need you to stand up and back away from her, right now.”
The man glanced down at Linda Abbott. She had stopped seizing, and was now lying peacefully on the ground. Her chest rose and fell with each breath she took, and he noted that her breathing appeared normal. Her skin had a grayish hue to it, though, and Williams was concerned about that.
“I need to treat the bite wound, Captain,” he insisted. “She is continuing to lose blood.”
Hertz shook his head. “Williams, she is now just like her son, and she will turn on all of us. I need you to step away from her immediately.”
The look on the EMT’s face changed, as if he suddenly gained understanding of what the captain was talking about. He slowly began to stand, using his hands to push himself up off the ground. As he rose, he turned to Hertz.
“Okay, sir. I’m going to - …”
Linda Abbott’s eyes flew open, and she had ahold of his arm in mere seconds; she had her teeth buried in his wrist in the blink of an eye.
Once again, gunfire rang out from all around, but this time most of the bullets fired hit the woman directly in the head, blowing it apart like a melon. It seemed that most of the officers had gained a clear understanding of the fact that only a headshot was going to stop the monsters they were dealing with. Even as her body lay lifeless, though, they all stood, guns drawn, ready to pump her full of lead once again if they had to. Soon EMT Williams turned as well.
What was happening was finally beginning to sink in.
The small town of Monte Vista was in for the nightmare of their lives…
Chapter 16
The town of Monte Vista, Colorado was on the verge of making history.
By the time the upcoming school year was set to begin today Monday, the only people who could be found in the school were the residents of Monte Vista who had barricaded themselves in to save their own lives, adults and children alike.
Fortunately, calls were made, and by six in the morning that same day, the news was able to make an emergency alert regarding the state of the small town, which was far from good, and rapidly getting worse.
∞
“Good morning to those of you able to tune in today. It’s Monday, August 29, and it looks like it will be a beautiful day weather-wise, but we will get to that in a bit…
“I’m Kelly Radcliffe, and this is the channel four morning news.
“State officials have received countless telephone calls from residents of Monte Vista, most of them starting last evening around five o’clock. According to the calls, there are individuals literally wandering the streets of the quaint town, violently attacking other residents, and in some reports, even eating them. Monte Vista mayor Tom Donnelly has currently called a ‘state of emergency’ for the town. Authorities are recommending that you do not, and I repeat do not, leave your homes for any reason. Keep all doors and windows locked, and remember to pull the shades and stay away from all windows.
“If for any reason you are not at home, and do not believe you can get to your home safely, emergency shelter is being offered at the Monte Vista High School. Police ask that you go directly there, and please, stop to talk to no one, and try to assist no one who appears to be in trouble.
Dustin…”
The male anchor took over. “Good morning, I’m Dustin Goldman. At the current time, federal authorities from the FBI to The Centers for Disease Control have dispatched teams to Monte Vista to investigate and subdue the situation there. Once again, remain in your homes or get to the high school; do not intervene in any attacks you may witness. Attackers appear to be infected with an unknown virus of some kind which has resulted in their violent state, and levels of infectiousness are unknown at this time.
“Again, do not go outside, and do not attempt to stop any attacks. Stay tuned to channel four news for constant updates as to the state of the situation in Monte Vista…”
∞
Mayor Tom Donnelly aimed his remote control at the flat screen hanging on his office wall and pressed the mute button, turning off the sound. He began to toy with the handheld device then, fidgeting with the buttons while the other men in his office waited in silence for him to speak. He shook his head in shock before opening his mouth.
“What the heck is going on here?”
He was making more of a statement than asking a question, and the others knew it. To his left sat the Monte Vista police captain Hertz, who was there to meet with the men after what he had experienced at Aspen, and next to him sat Rio Grande County Sheriff Burt Stahling. On his right was his trusted advisor Nicholas Stone, and beside him was city manager Clyde Smith.
All of the men were in a state of shock and confusion.
They waited for the phone to ring. Mayor Donnelly was expecting to hear from someone from the FBI to let them know they had arrived in town. He wanted them here, no, needed them here, yesterday. He was beside himself with concern, and felt completely helpless being barricaded in city hall like some chicken. He had been in a war, for sakes!
“Clyde, let’s take it from the top again,” he said flatly. “I want to know precisely where we are when these people arrive.”
Clyde cleared his throat and grabbed a few sheets of paper from the edge of Donnelly’s desk. “Chief Hertz’s emergency dispatch received a call from one Doris Fisher, sister of Maxwell, yesterday evening. She stated that her brother had gone to check on his neighbor, Paige Daugherty, and he didn’t return for a significant amount of time.”
He shuffled through the papers briefly, then continued.
“His slowness prompted Ms. Fisher to go check on him because they had dinner reservations,” he said. “According to her, when she approached Daugherty’s residence she observed one Kathy Olson and her son Brian leaving through the front door. They appeared to be severely intoxicated, and when they took notice of her they turned in her direction and began to chase her.”
Donnelly held his hand up to Clyde Smith, signifying he wanted him to briefly halt. He thought for a moment in silence, then motioned for the man to continue. Clyde cleared his throat once again.
“Doris Fisher said they were chasing her slowly, staggering. Almost struggling to walk. They only grunted; they didn’t yell her name or anything. She claimed to be terrified that they were going to beat her up or something, though there was no reason, so she ran back to her brother’s place. A ladder was against the side of the house, so she climbed it and pulled it up after her to keep them from going up. At that point she saw her brother and Ms. Daugherty approaching, staggering in the same manner.
“She also said each one of them was ‘beaten, bloody, and torn up on their skin’.”
Donnelly stood up and grabbed a stress ball off his desk. He began to pace and toss the object from hand to hand. “What the heck does any of this mean?”
No one answered him. After a bit Clyde cleared his throat once again to let him know he was going to keep going. The mayor understood, and Clyde, though terribly frightened and emotionally drained, did not object.
“Ms. Fisher also claimed that while she was on the roof of the home, the four individuals clawed at the house, and yelled unintelligibly at her. She stated that they growled and groaned more than anything else, making absolutely no sense. Another neighbor from across the street, one Marvin Potter, came running for them all in an attempt to offer Ms. Fisher assistance.”
With this Clyde Smith stopped and took a deep breath. Even though he had read the report around seven times already during the course of the meeting, it bothered him immensely to read the next part. He couldn’t comprehend it, and frankly, he had a difficult time believing it to be true, even though he knew it was.
Once more, Clyde breathed out raggedly, cleared his throat as per his habit, took a deep breath, and began once more.
“Doris Fisher then says that the four on the ground turned on Mr. Potter in a manner that reminded her ‘of a pack of dogs’.
They ripped and tore at him, fighting with each other over him, and then began… eating him.”
Clyde dropped the papers on the table with a bit of dramatic flair, sat back in his chair, and began to rub his eyes. “I really don’t want to have to read that again, Tom.”
“Reading that is just the beginning, Clyde,” Sheriff Burt Stahling said in a quiet voice. “It has gotten much worse, and very quickly, at that.”
Mayor Donnelly stopped at the window to his office and crossed his arms over his chest. He continued to turn the stress ball around in his left hand as he gazed outside. He could see people running about, and he also had clear view of two of the ‘deadwalkers’, as his own mind had started to call them. They were chasing what appeared to be a couple of teenagers, as he looked out from the third floor city window.
The men fell silent once again, all of their eyes on the back of Mayor Donnelly, who was still looking out the window of his office at the violence and carnage taking place below. He had never seen anything like it; his town was literally eating itself alive!
How the heck would anyone, even the FBI or CDC, deal with this insane situation?
At that exact moment the phone on his desk rang, emitting three consecutive chirps before briefly going silent and then repeating the pattern.
Donnelly crossed his office in two strides and plucked the telephone receiver from the base.
“This is Donnelly,” he said in a deep, disturbed voice.
“Mayor Thomas Donnelly?” the voice on the other end inquired. “My name is Calvin Clemons; I’m an emergency response specialist for the Centers for Disease Control with the United States government. We have just arrived in Monte Vista in response to a request for assistance with an unknown health threat.”
Donnelly closed his eyes and breathed a massive sigh of relief. “Yes, Mr. Clemons. I’m so glad to hear from you. I called for assistance from either you or the FBI or both, whatever is appropriate.”
“Currently we are at the San Luis Valley Regional Airport,” the man continued. “We have a team ready to go to work, along with agents from the FBI. Can you please give me a little more information on what is actually happening in Monte Vista?”
Donnelly’s right hand went to his eyes and began to rub. “I don’t know much. Yesterday one of our locals reported being nearly attacked by neighbors, who then proceeded to attack another neighbor and… eat him, right before her eyes.”
“She knew the attackers?” Clemons asked.
Donnelly chuckled. “She not only knew them, but one of them was her brother.”
Clemons did not respond right away to the words he heard. Donnelly waited, somewhat impatiently, even rolling his eyes as his ears peeled for any sound from the other end. What the heck was going on with these people?
Finally, the man spoke. “Mayor Donnelly, we will need a safe base for operations. Where do you suggest we proceed to?”
“We have an emergency shelter set up at the high school. The only people you should find there are those who didn’t make it home in time to be safe from the… deadwalkers.”
“Deadwalkers?” Clemons asked. “Did you just call them ‘Deadwalkers’?”
Donnelly closed his eyes again and a condescending smile came over his face. “Yes, I did. Why?”
“Why are you referring to them as ‘Deadwalkers’, Mayor?”
He chuckled again. “Because they are dead, that’s why.”
The man on the other end of the line went silent. Donnelly waited patiently for him to gather himself; he knew what he had just said was particularly hard to digest. It was like something out of a nightmare or a bad movie.
Finally, Clemons spoke. “So, you are reporting that dead people are walking around, eating other people, and making more of the same? Do I have this right?”
Hearing the incredulity in the man’s voice, the mayor began to get irritated. “Listen, my town is in a literal state of emergency. I don’t care what it is that’s causing this, I just want it stopped, and you people are the ones to call. So, you’re here. What are you going to do?”
“Well,” Clemons replied. “We are going to need transportation from here to the high school, and from there we will determine the next step.”
When Donnelly finally hung up he looked around at the other men in his office, all of whom were staring at him with expectant looks on their faces. After a moment his eyes settled on Sheriff Stahling.
“Burt, their team needs transportation to the high school from the airport,” he said. “Please send three of your cars.” He turned to Captain Hertz. “Could you do the same as well, Eli?”
The men both nodded and got on their cellular phones immediately. Mayor Donnelly walked around to the chair at his desk and sat down hard. After rubbing his eyes, he shook his head.
“I don’t know what these men are going to be able to do, but I sure as heck hope they do something fast.”
Chapter 17
Agent Charles Cole of the FBI sat in the mayor’s office at Monte Vista City Hall with another of his men, who sat next to him taking notes. Mayor Donnelly stared at him somberly as he spoke, his own advisor, Nick Stone, busily taking notes as well.
“Mayor, the situation here in Monte Vista is, unfortunately, only the tip of the iceberg,” he was saying in a monotone voice. “We have also had identical reports from around Colorado; Utah, Wyoming, New Mexico, and Kansas are also in the throes of this crisis, and teams have been sent there from the CDC, as well.”
“What do they say is going on?” Donnelly asked as he leaned forward on his elbows.
Agent Cole avoided the mayor’s eyes. “To be honest, we really have no idea. Not yet, anyway.”
Donnelly stood up. “Come over here, Agent,” he said as he walked to the office window.
Cole glanced at the other two men before standing and following the mayor.
“Look down there,” Donnelly began. He pointed with his forefinger to the ground below, gesturing toward the violence and chaos going on beneath them. “We are locked up tight in this building. Those that are here right now will not be allowed to leave until this issue is solved, and that includes you and your ‘yes man’ there. Is this really a situation you want to be stuck in?”
Cole watched the carnage. “Of course not, Mayor. I can tell you that the Army and National Guard are on the case, and they have discovered that destruction of the head is the only thing that will permanently disable these… ‘Deadwalkers’, as you call them. The CDC teams in all affected areas have several of them… disabled, and they are studying them furiously as we speak. That is all I can say.”
Cole’s partner spoke up. “We are safe here. Something is being done. But the infection process cannot truly be stopped altogether until we discover the source of it.
Charles Cole’s cell phone began to chirp in his pocket. The silence of all the men in the office made the chirping seem extraordinarily loud. So loud, in fact, that Cole jerked, startled by the stark noise.
“This is Cole,” he stated in a monotone voice into the phone.
He had the attention of everyone in the room. All of them stared, eager and expectant. At this point in the game the caller could only be a handful of people: the CDC, other FBI, or someone much higher up on the political ladder. Whoever it was, all of them were anxious to hear from someone who could approve them to begin moving things along at a much faster rate.
A small, tinny mumbling was audible from the phone, though the words that were being spoken could not be made out at all. Every now and then Cole would nod and say, ‘mm-hmm’. Mostly, though, he simply stated ‘yes sir’ to most everything that was said to him.
Whoever was on the phone continued to speak for several minutes, and toward the very end of the call Cole closed his eyes and put his head in his free hand. It was a very hopeless gesture to all those in the office, and they all exchanged glances of doubt. Finally, Charles Cole flipped the cell shut, took a deep breath, and began.
“That was Ca
lvin Clemons with the CDC team down at the high school,” he said as he rubbed his forehead. “He had some good things to say, and some pretty scary things, as well. Heck, I’m not even sure where to begin.”
“How about at the beginning?” Tom Donnelly asked with both sarcasm and frustration.
Cole shot him a look, took a deep breath, and began. “Well, it seems that the good news is this: one of the ‘disabled’ people who were infected was brought to Clemons with several others,” he said, and then cleared his throat and sat back. “He began a general ‘autopsy’, as he referred to it. On this particular individual, who happened to be an elementary aged child, there were scrapes on his elbows, as if he had fallen on a sidewalk, or wrecked his bicycle. Around the scrapes on the child’s right elbow was smeared ink, and according to Clemons it wasn’t our typical ink.”
“What do you mean?” Nick Stone asked with a knit brow.
“Well, it seems that the ink was somewhat… three dimensional,” Cole replied. “As a matter of fact, Clemons says it was almost holographic in appearance, even on the child’s skin.”
Now Cole stood and began to pace as he talked. “So it now seems infected rats are not the only source. He did a bit of research, and he stated that it wasn’t difficult to find out what it was: it was ink from a pen just released before the school year. The pen is called the Aspen ‘Lumiosa’, and it is manufactured in a plant on the outskirts of town. A recall has been ordered, and I am to call the plant to demand the order be carried out as soon as I am finished. It seems, after testing, that the ink breaks down living cells and, according to Clemons’ tests, also acts to keep the dead cells… animated.”
“I don’t understand,” Donnelly said.
Cole turned to him. “It kills, but it keeps the things it kills alive. There is no other way to put it. Now, I have to contact the Aspen Company. If you gentlemen will excuse me for just a moment… Donnelly, may I use your computer to get some phone numbers, please?”
“Absolutely.” The mayor went to his desk and signed himself into the computer, then moved aside so Cole could sit comfortably and do what he needed to do. No one said anything as he searched the Internet; the fact was, no one had anything to say.