Queen's Gambit

by M. Lorrox

  He walks around to the back of the car that currently blocks the bus and stands between it and the van behind it. It honks.

  Skip points to the bus. “Filled with kids! Let us out!”

  Instead of honking at him, the van’s driver starts pointing at Skip, and then at the bus fervently. Skip squints his eyes and tilts his head. What’s his deal?

  -pop- -pop, pop, pop-

  Skip turns to the direction of the strange sounds. People are running… He steps out of the lane and climbs up the stone fence that separates the museum’s grounds and the sidewalk. He shades his eyes from the bright afternoon sun. They’re running from the metro station?

  -pop- -pop, pop, pop, pop, pop-

  What in the world? Is that gunfire? Then he hears something yelled from across the green grass of the National Mall that makes him shake. “ZOMBIES!”

  He looks again toward the metro entrance that juts out of the ground a few hundred yards away and watches as zombies start pouring out, running extremely fast and attacking people from behind as they try and escape. Oh god.

  He turns and slips off the stone fence, landing awkwardly on his left ankle. He hop-jogs back to the bus while waving his arms to get Frank’s attention.

  The doors open, he crawls inside, and he reaches up and pushes the control levers to close the doors. “Lock everything! Don’t let anybody in!”

  Frank locks the door, and he looks in the curved, aisle mirror at all the faces that are looking back at him. Slowly, they start looking out the windows. When the first fist lands on the door to the bus, the passengers are surprised. By the time the fifteenth, and in seconds later, when the fiftieth terrified person is banging on the bus with hopes of being let inside; all the kids and half the chaperones on the bus are either crying, shaking, or shouting.

  A medical transport helicopter lands in the wide grass at Gravelly Point, and Charlie runs out to meet it. He points back to the entrance to the tunnel, which just appears to be an old, empty utility tunnel in the afternoon sun. Two medics carrying a stretcher hop out and run across the grass.

  When they get June and Enrique to the helicopter, Charlie demands blood transfusions for everyone. One medic lifts his goggles to reveal his vampire eyes and a giant scar stretching across his face. “You’re in good hands, sir.” He grabs a cooler and slides it over toward the edge of the helicopter, then opens it. “We’ve got a dozen pints.”

  Charlie nods. “Thank you.”

  The vampire medic leans over to Charlie. “Transfusions for everyone, sir?” He motions toward June and the crisp sheet that covers her.

  “Do I need to say so again?”

  “Sorry. No, you don’t.”

  While the two medics hook up IV’s to June and Enrique, Charlie, Sadie, and Eddy stand outside the helicopter. Sadie and Eddy each grab a pint of blood from the cooler and drink. Charlie watches them for a moment, then he grabs two pints and walks away. He opens one with his teeth and sucks it flat while he heads toward an old and lonely tree.

  When he gets there, he walks around it until he finds a large cavity where something once hurt the tree and the tree grew around the spot. This’ll work… Yeah, this’ll do.

  He slips off his battle-pack and opens it. The bundle of blanket holding Rusty’s charred remains lies inside. Charlie lifts the bundle out and sets it in the hollowed area of the tree.

  He puts his hand on the bundle—on Rusty—and he closes his eyes.

  He opens them and takes a shaky breath, then he bites a small hole in the remaining pint of blood and sets it in the blanket—positioned so it will drip down onto the remains. “One last drink, eh, buddy?”

  Charlie’s eyes slowly close, and his heart sinks with his spirit until he’s crying.

  Beside the helicopter, Sadie chokes back a tear at the sight of Charlie with his head bowed in the distance. She snuffs a breath and turns to Eddy. “Go be with your father. He’s burying Rusty. I’ll stay here.”

  Eddy watches as one of the medics adds another pint to June’s IV.

  “Eddy…”

  “Do you think she’ll come back?”

  Tears flush Sadie’s eyes. “Your dad needs you right now. Please go to him.”

  Without another word, he turns and jogs over. “Hey Dad.”

  Charlie looks at him with wet eyes. “Hey, son.”

  “Dad?”

  Charlie reaches his arm around him. “Yeah, Eddy?”

  “I’m sorry, Dad.”

  “Me too.” They both stand and stare at the bundle in the tree for almost an entire minute.

  Eddy wipes his nose. “How did Rusty do those things? What was he?”

  He shakes his head. “There was nothing else like him. I never really understood that...that Rusty.”

  “I thought you said he couldn’t die.”

  Charlie wipes his face, then shrugs. “He might be doing it to spite me.” He lowers his head. “Damn I’m gonna miss him.”

  Eddy hugs onto his father’s side. “We all will.”

  Offshore in a twenty-two-foot, Penn Yan tunnel-drive boat, Dr. Melgaard watches the medical transport helicopter land near the tunnel’s opening through a pair of gimble-stabilized, high-powered binoculars. He watches the medics running stretchers back and forth and the family lulling about. He watches another minute, then he shrugs.

  He sets the binoculars down and walks to the shade of the canopy. Steikje. He pauses a moment as he looks at Michael’s organ transportation cooler. He chuckles. “You were good alright, very clever with your toys.” He shakes his head and sighs. At least now I don’t have to kill you myself.

  He glances at the backpack filled with June’s blood and bone marrow, and then to a crate he had previously stowed on the boat with other zombie samples and viral strains. His lips pull into a smile that reveals his teeth.

  He shifts the boat out of neutral and into forward drive. He increases the throttle slowly as he brings the boat up to speed. He turns the boat due south, straight down the river. When his path is clear, he unlocks a cabinet and retrieves a satellite phone.

  He hits some buttons and pushes send, but he doesn’t lift it to his ear. He doesn’t end the call either. Instead, he sets the phone down on the dash—where it has a clear view of the sky—and resets his chronometer.

  He takes a calm breath, looks out into the clear day and calm waters, and starts whistling an old Norwegian folk song.

  As the helicopter takes off from Gravelly Point, the people in the Washington DC Metro Area—over ten million people—are doing a variety of different things. Some, near the breached metros, are trying to find safety and not get eaten by zombies. Some, who are not near the breached metros, are glad they’re not near the breached metros, and they worry both about the people who are in danger and about staying safe.

  Some enact emergency plans. Some shelter in place. Some grab a weapon and head toward the danger. Some don’t realize the full threat and continue about their business.

  The message Dr. Melgaard sends through the satellite phone reaches a telecom satellite and is routed to its destination. There, a computer program is executed, and it, in turn, signals to initiate two types of systems.

  Each system is dangerous, and in conjunction, they’re devastating.

  In a dozen sites across the area—in Virginia, Washington DC, and in Maryland—electrical machines that range in size from briefcases to minivans start to actuate and charge capacitors. In each, a timer starts counting down from three hundred seconds as an electrical hum builds.

  In a dozen different sites across the same area—many of which are underground— something else also starts to happen. Green LEDs glow on control panels attached to large, metal storage containers. Inside each container, a buzzer sounds, and a relay clicks. A motor in each container starts to hum as it spins a worm gear, slowly opening the container’s
heavy, metal door.

  At first the containers’ doors are open only a crack...

  Then an inch...

  Then a few inches...

  Then decayed hands reach out of the openings.

  Within seconds, when the motors and buzzers stop and the doors are open, the zombies stored inside are freed. They stream out of the containers, growling, clawing, searching, and hungry.

  “In life, unlike chess, the game continues after checkmate.”

  -Isaac Asimov (1920 – 1992)

  “Send in your skeletons;

  sing as their bones go marching in, again.”

  -Foo Fighters

  Wow, this book was really challenging to write. Lily, my alpha reader, probably read and gave comments on four variations of this beast. I am so grateful for her early help and for all the great comments my beta readers provided me. Without these amazing people and their hard work, this book would have been a pale, crappy shadow of its current, epic badassery. And it’s long! Jeez, I owe you all so much. THANK YOU.

  My favorite editor, Ashley Elizabeth, continues to wrangle my crazy style into submission. I imagine her rolling up her sleeves, cracking her neck with a fist, then slugging it out with my writing. There’s certainly swearing, spitting, and plenty of fighting-dirty in these imaginary rounds. One thing’s for sure: whatever she truly does between the bells, she does a wonderful job!

  I’ve got to thank John Gibson once again for formatting these books. The work he does makes them SO DAMN COOL. Also, I know I can be a pain to work with, so hat’s off bud! Thank you so much.

  Is it story time? Before that, I’ll mention one thing. If you haven’t reviewed my books, please, please, please do so. If you need links, you can find them at https://series.infinitevampire.com. As a new and unknown author, it’s crucial to have many reviews of my work. If you want me to keep writing, please do this for me!

  ...I suppose if you DON’T want me to keep writing, then...well...you can cram it! I’m not stopping now.

  Okay. Story time!

  My dad taught me how to play chess when I was young, and we’d play at night on the kitchen table of the barn we lived in (yes, laugh it up—I was raised in a barn). He was drafted and served in Vietnam, and after a tour, he was stationed in Japan. He got his

  chess set there. All the pieces were carved stone and featured peasants, samurai, monks, pagodas, shoguns as kings, and elegant geishas as queens.

  As much as I recall the pieces and the games we played, the thing I remember most is that I NEVER BEAT HIM. Not once. It was awful, and it drove me nuts. I was really close one time though, but this was before I understood what a poker-face was. Somehow, while I was fist-pumping and jumping around like an idiot, he was able to tell that I had a killer move planned.

  We stalemated that night. Being so close but not succeeding crushed me.

  I’ll admit: I’m incredibly stubborn, and I can be a royal pain. To spite me, you know what he did when he noticed my skills improving? Of course you don’t, but I bet you can guess. He lost interest in playing chess with me.

  That bastard.

  Just kidding. I was getting older, and we probably did something else instead. My pitiful record thus stands: 0, 100+, 1.

  What I lacked in wins, I gained in determination points. When I said that this book was a challenge to write, I was just being nice. It was a bitch and a half. BUT, that determination, that focus, that unquenchable drive to succeed I gained from both of my parents and from my less-than-extravagant youth pushes me.

  Chess is a not-so-minor part of this book, but I’m not exactly sure where the idea of incorporating it came from. I think I wanted to allude to some odd contradictions associated with the game: it’s ancient, but we play it today; its rules are easy, but becoming a master is very difficult. It’s a battle waged between minds and set on a tiny board, where strategy and patience are the currencies of play.

  I wanted the identities of the players to be a bit of a mystery in QUEEN’S GAMBIT, so I rolled with chess as a thematic element. After I “finished” writing it, I realized that the book itself mimics the stages in a chess game... I loved the idea of matching the book’s structure to the phases in a game, so, stubborn as I am, I couldn’t NOT rework the whole thing and “finish” it again.

  I’m glad for my effort, and I hope that you and my other readers are too. I joked earlier about continuing to write whether people like what I make or not, but the truth is that I really do value and appreciate my audience. If I didn’t, I swear that I would not be an author, because it’s really a ton of work.

  Last thing! If you’re itchin’ to challenge me to a chess game, keep in mind that although I bet I could beat my dad, I’m still pretty bad! I think everyone on Earth would benefit from me practicing to become a better writer instead of me trying to be a less-terrible chess player.

  -M.

  I’m an emerging American author. My story is like any good novel; it’s full of mystery, suspense, drama, and comedy. Hopefully my story turns into a fine wine—instead of a stinky cheese. In any case, while I’m writing that book (as slowly as possible), here are some highlights so far:

  I was raised in a barn in rural, upstate New York. It was cold. We had a wood-burning furnace that never worked well. I gained an early appreciation for sweaters.

  In junior high, I tried…and failed, to publish a book about dragon science. I still have the manuscript, and I’ll publish it someday.

  In college, I made up some BS, then earned a MFA in story-telling. I learned Northern Shaolin Kung Fu and taught it for a while.

  After college, I discovered I had problems with authority… And conformity… And bigotry… And misogyny… And etc., etc., etc. I tried to make small changes while still fitting in, then I gave up on fitting in altogether, and I started flipping tables like no tomorrow.

  I bought a motorcycle and crashed it. Then I fixed it and kept riding. Hey, want to harden your nerves? Spend a couple years riding 25 miles a day, rain or shine, on Route 66 and the 495 Beltway of DC in rush hour. You’ll either be dead or a badass.

  After gaining badass status, I wanted to postpone putting that last update on a gravestone, so I decided to move out of the busy DC area. Instead of renewing the lease on my apartment, I signed up for an awesome gym membership, moved my stuff into storage, and squatted in a DC warehouse for a few months. I worked out and showered daily at the gym, which required me to carry various bags around. Homeless people on my routes thought I was also homeless, and they would offer me advice. I always thanked them.

  After six months of shenanigans, I decided to push my luck in DC, and I signed a lease for an affordable apartment on the top floor of a building. The roof

  collapsed on me on Valentine’s Day. I took a selfie with the rubble on my head; I was pissed.

  I now live in Durham, North Carolina in a nice, warm house with a good roof. My local gym isn’t fancy, but it does the job. I enjoy riding my motorcycle to local coffee shops, very safely. Most importantly, I continue flipping tables like no tomorrow.

  As the emergency medical helicopter lifts off from Gravelly Point in Virginia, the passengers are silent and still. With the roar of the rotors above them saturating their minds, they have to focus just to think. The realities they face, none would ever have chosen.

  Charlie watches out his window as the old, lonely tree grows smaller. In a hollow within its trunk, he laid Rusty—his companion for the last one hundred and twenty-five years—to rest. June’s body lays on a stretcher across the helicopter’s floor, and Eddy leans over her, holding her lifeless hand. The tears in his eyes help to obscure the image of her mutilation.

  Sadie watches her son go through hell, only to look at June’s body and feel the wrenching loss herself. Next to her, alongside the helicopter’s other window, Enrique sits with his eyes closed. He breathes
through the pain that still sears from the hole in his leg and the gash across his back.

  None of them know that the explosion Michael set off also released the tens of thousands of zombies in the Pentagon into the metro system. Zombies that are now ripping their way through the three tunnels connected to the Pentagon Metro station, and that are rampaging out of other stations and attacking people in Northern Virginia and in Washington DC.

  No one anywhere yet knows that Dr. Melgaard triggered the release of other zombies and the initialization of specially designed electronic equipment. All that the sorrow laden passengers of the helicopter know, is that for the moment, they’re allowed to sit and rest.

  The vampire medic hooks up another pint of blood into June’s IV, then he checks Enrique’s IV and his various bandages. “How are you holding up, bud?”

  Enrique answers with his eyes still closed. “Been better.”

  As the helicopter banks toward the hospital, Charlie’s window faces downtown DC. He swallows, thinking about his daughter and about his best friend, and he hopes that they’re safe.

  Across the river, all traffic is jammed. People wait and sweat in their cars while they listen to updates on the radio. None of the recent news has been good.

  A black and chromed, ‘87 Buick Grand National blasts rap music instead of the news. When someone runs up to the car and skids across the giant hood like Bo Duke, the white guy behind the wheel turns down the music and blows up. “Did you see that shithead? That’s uncalled for.”

  The larger black man in the passenger seat shakes his head. “No respect.” He looks out and sees more people running their way. “Ah fuck. Looks like it’s show time, brother. You ready for this shit?”

  “As ready as I’m gonna be.” He blasts the music again and pops the trunk. Both men hop out and walk to the back of the car.