by Cesar Vitale
"The what?" I ask, looking from the metal cart to his half-closed eyes. "Levon, we gotta go!"
"The log. Take it."
Getting up, I browse clumsily through the medical gear on the cart. "What log!?"
"The papers," Levon says, with difficulty. "Under the glove box."
I pull the box aside, uncovering a block of papers stuck together with a rusty metal clip.
"They're far, still," Levon says, as the voices slow but steadily grow louder out the window. "Read it. Read the log."
"Levon, we –"
"Just read it," he says, as firmly as his voice allows him to.
Trying to keep focused, I pull the cart sideways and take a step towards the window, letting moonlight shine on the first page.
It's handwritten.
01
-The army's gone. The doctors are gone. There's no one here. Kyle told me to keep a journal, in case people…find us. It seems some kind of explosion compromised the place, down on the fourth floor. We are looking into it tomorrow.
02
-The boys have finished going through the Infectology lab. Everything's ruined. We're waiting for Scott to come back, he's searching on the other floors, but, at least for now, it seems that whatever papers the army was logging progress on the cure have been destroyed by the explosion.
03
-Jared found ampules. A transparent liquid inside them, and they're all marked #41. We don't know what it means. Stacy's kid is getting worse, he can't write anymore, so we can't talk to him. He's not eating the food, either. Most of the time he just stands there, staring into nothing. Someone suggested we try to find him a dead body from outside, but no one wants to go back to the streets.
Stacy's reluctant to have her son be the guinea pig. We might not have another choice, though.
-Kyle got the radio working. Not that anyone's broadcasting anything.
04
-#41 ACTUALLY WORKS! Stacy's kid was talking and acting normal within five minutes of the injection and, so far, no side effects we can see. This should be better news, but we only have four ampules left. We have eight infected people. Including my daughter.
05
-Meredith used one of the ampules on her husband, behind our back. Jared was not happy.
- Three ampules left. And we have seven family members in need of help here, four of which are getting critical. Jared and Meredith had a fight, earlier. Jared punched Meredith. Things are bad.
06
-We found some food the army left behind. Cans and powdered protein. Most importantly, Scott managed to get a signal on the radio, and we got in touch with survivors in Nantucket. Waiting to see what happens.
07
-Nantucket has a functioning TAS, complete with a working chopper. They have close to five hundred survivors there. Kyle says they can pick us up on the rooftop in two days. Jared wants to bring at least one ampule to them, so maybe they can restart progress on the cure. This leaves us with only two ampules, and seven sick people.
-Kyle's cousin tried to attack Jared.
08
-Kyle has used one of the two spare ampules on his cousin. Jared is browsing through the other floors now. I don't want to be near when he finds out.
-There was an argument upstairs. Kyle is dead. We heard a gun. We think Jared shot him, but no one has had the courage to ask.
-No one talks. Jared has the ampules hidden, and won't tell us where. He says he'll work out who will use the spare one, and the last one goes with us to Nantuket. The infected ones will stay behind.
09
-I found the ampules. Everyone is asleep.
-My daughter is well. I can't put into words the relief. We have to go now, though. Jared won't let this slide. I hear steps outside. My daughter says she can hear voices, screaming and growing louder. All I hear are grunts. I wonder if the symptoms of her infection have still to wear out completely.
I finish reading, raising my eyes up to the rain beating the window outside. The voices grow louder, but I don't process it.
"They died before the chopper came," I say, to myself. "And they had the cure. They had the –"
I twitch my leg as I feel the pinch. Looking down, I see Levon pressing on the base of the syringe, pushing the translucent liquid all the way in.
"Levon!" I yell, widening my eyes at him. His hand slips and, breathing heavily, he collapses back to his pool of blood.
The empty syringe rolls away from us, stopping between the wheels of the cart.
"Found where old Jared was hiding the treasure, last night," he says, in a weak voice, shaking the empty ampule between his fingers. "I hadn't lost hope that you might show up. So I saved it."
CHAPTER 14
I turn my neck around so fast a Hollywood producer passing by might hire me on the spot for an Exorcist reboot. Behind us, what I thought was a zombie coming through the door turns out to be Tommy, bouncing away with yet another disturbingly human-looking bone between his teeth.
"He's been browsing around the building since yesterday," Levon explains. "I never know what he's going to bring me next."
Outside, the voices are growing quieter by the second, replaced by incoherent grunts.
"Levon, I --"
"Eve, listen to me," Levon interrupts, and I have to lean closer to hear him. "You're getting out of here."
The haze is gone, almost completely. That heavy weight in my chest I've been carrying for the last month has lifted. All around, things seem to be regaining an original color I didn't remember they even had – like the world has been gradually turning sepia, a little each day so I wouldn't notice, and now it's all rushing back to color at once.
"Why did you use it on me, Levon?" I ask, cleaning blood from his cheek. "Why did you do it?"
"I called… Nantucket," Levon continues. "Last night."
From the stairway door behind us, the murmur of a thousand grunts and steps reaches my ears, amplified by the echoing of the narrow path leading up to our floor.
The zombies are in the building.
"The chopper is coming," Levon continues, breathing hard with each word. "They are coming to get you."
"To get us, Levon," I reply. His face is paler than ever now, and his eyes might as well have blood dripping out of them, they're so red. More and more, his words begins to sound scratchy and low-pitched. Like grunts.
Levon shakes his head. Outside, the rain batters violently against the window.
"Come on," I say, lifting him up. "Let's go."
Again, Levon shakes his head, setting himself free and sliding back to the floor. "No, Eve."
"I'm not leaving you here, Levon."
"You gotta take… the stairs up to the roof, Eve," Levon whispers. "Before the herd climbs them. Otherwise you're trapped here."
"Then let's get going!" I insist, grabbing him again. He pushes my hand away.
"Nantucket won't take me," he breathes out.
"What are you talking --?"
"They won't take anyone infected," Levon explains. "I talked to them. If they see you with me, they won't even land."
I pause, ignoring the sound of the climbing footsteps out the door. Through the window
from above, the distant humming of propellers reaches my ears.
"You have to go, Eve," Levon says, pulling me close by the collar so I can hear him. "Now."
"Levon," I start, ready to protest. "You can't --"
"If you don't go, we both die," he says. "And then I'd just feel stupid for wasting that syringe on you."
The propeller sound gets louder and louder.
"Jesus, is this what zombies sound like to each other?" Levon asks, as the grunts grow nearer. "All they talk about is food. Is it always this annoying?"
"Pretty much," I reply, trying to smile.
"Here," Levon says, raising his hip from the ground and pulling something from his pocket. "I know it's no golden locket, but…"
He opens his hand to me. I grab the little silver me
tal, raising it up against the light from the window.
Mortal Kombat Pasadena Tournament – 2009 – Participation Medal.
"You told me you won," I reply, looking from the medal to Levon.
"Yeah… sorry about that," Levon replies, with a faint smile. "I wanted you to think I'm cool."
I smile back. "You really don't know what 'cool' means, do you, Levon?"
For a moment, neither of us say anything. The grunts and steps outside get louder. Even the rain seems to be hammering harder against the windows.
"Hey, Eve," Levon whispers, forcing his eyes up at me. "Can you do me a solid, before you go?"
I keep my eyes on his. After a moment, I nod slowly.
Levon pulls his gaze from me to the .22 lying a few feet away from him under the metal cart.
"Please," he says, taking my hand. "Quick. Before you go."
He stretches to his side and, with his free hand, pushes the gun my way. Leaning back against the wall, his eyes find mine. "You know… so I don't have to hear these assholes talk anymore."
I can't hold back a chuckle between the tears. "Levon…" I start, but I can't think of anything to say next.
Out the staircase door, the sound of furniture being dropped to the floor reaches us in a loud bang.
"Come on," Levon says, pressing my hand tighter. "You gotta go, Eve."
Taking my first real deep breath for the first time in a month, and summoning courage from I have no idea where, I let go of Levon's hand, rising from the ground.
With the .22 nested in my left hand, I look down at Levon. His eyes are on me. He's crying, too, but he doesn't look scared.
"I'm sorry, Levon," I sniff, cleaning my nose with the back of my sleeve. "I'm so sorry."
"Grrr," Levon replies, calmly.
"You're gone, already," I say to myself, crying harder. "I can't understand you anymore."
"Nah, I'm just fucking with you," Levon says, managing a last smile between bloody teeth. "Now come on. Get it over with."
He pulls a deep breath in, holding his eyes on me. The steps and grunts outside are so loud I'm half sure the zombies are just waiting for me to finish to burst through the door.
"Please, Eve," Levon says, trying to keep his voice steady. "Please do it. Now."
A bright light flashes through the window as the chopper dives between the buildings.
Levon closes his eyes.
"Please, Eve."
A loud bang on the staircase door reaches us. The zombies are here.
"Please."
I turn my face away and I fire. Once. Twice. Three times.
Panting, I drop the gun to the ground. And I fall to my knees.
I can't bear to look his way. The propeller sound is deafening, already, and the whole building seems to be shaking with a thousand angry zombies inside.
I close my eyes. Screw it. Let this end now.
Fuck it.
Fuck it.
Fuck – huh?
I open my eyes to Tommy, licking my chin away in joy.
"Hey," I whisper, smiling at him.
'Are there any souls inside?' comes a metallic, amplified voice from outside.
"Hey there, Tommy," I repeat, running my hand through his fur.
'We will not land unless we have visual confirmation of non-infected humans', the voice comes again.
"I had a dog like you, when I was younger," I say, as the staircase door shakes with the bumping of zombie fists against the other side. "It died."
'We are turning back. I repeat, we are turning back.'
Tommy starts sniffing me, starting in my ears and going down my arm towards my hand.
I open my fingers. Levon's participation medal is bathed in my sweat, nested in the palm of my hand.
The door shakes again.
I close my eyes, then I open them again. The door bangs one more time, and, with a loud thud, comes loose from its hinges and falls down to the ground.
I raise my eyes. Decided.
In a single movement, I get up from the ground, taking Tommy with me.
"Come on," I say. For a second, I'm tempted to look back. To look at Levon's body. But I don't.
The herd starts penguining my way, a thousand zombies elbowing each other, flooding the room.
With Tommy in my right hand and Levon's medal in my left, I run towards them.
"Fuck you!" I yell, colliding against the first row. The zombies fall back, knocking others behind them in the world's most disgusting domino effect.
I regain balance, right in the middle of the herd. To my left, three zombies stand between myself and the stairs heading up.
"And fuck you too!" I say, kicking the one in the middle. He falls down and, before the others can close in on me, I pass through them, rushing up the stairs.
"I'm here! I'm here!" I scream as I reach the last floor, projecting myself through the metal door out to the roof. The helicopter is pulling away.
"Come back! Come back!"
It stands still for a moment, midair like a dragonfly. Then, slowly, the chopper points its nose towards me and starts to descend.
"I'm not infected!" I yell, as a man in military outfit steps out of the helicopter. "I know I look like a zombie, but I'm not infected!"
A second man steps out and makes way towards me. He raises a metal device to my eye. After a second, the device beeps.
"She's all right," he screams, over the sound of rain and wind to his partner.
Behind me, the metal door bursts open, and a new batch of zombies storms out, arms raised our way.
"Come on, we gotta go," soldier man number one says, grabbing my arm. "Is the dog coming too?"
"Yeah," I yell back, as they help me up the helicopter.
The zombies pull back as the chopper takes off, one by one making their way back inside the building.
EPILOGUE
"How bad is it?" soldier man asks me, once we reach enough altitude. "The mainland, I mean."
"Pretty bad," I reply, keeping my eyes on Tommy, who's resting on my lap.
"We don't hear from a lot of people, anymore," the soldier continues. "Figured almost everyone has died or turned, already."
"Almost," I say, turning my eyes outside. Through the windows of the ever-distancing hospital building, I can see the zombies taking over the fifth floor, wave after wave until the whole row of windows is one grey mass.
It's quiet here. Even over the sound of the wind gushing in through the openings, it's quiet.
No zombies talking. No grunts.
I pull my gaze back inside the chopper. In front of us, just after a small patch of broken city, the ocean extends itself ahead in blackness until the horizon.
"What's your name?" the soldier asks.
I look down at my hand. Slowly, I open my fingers. Levon's Mortal Kombat medal shines bright at me, reflecting the internal lights of the helicopter like a gemstone.
"Kid?" the soldier asks. "Can you hear me?"
"Eve," I say, looking from the medal to the soldier. Out the window behind him, land gives way to sea, as the chopper flies steadily towards what I hope are better days.
"My name is Eve."