by Evans, Mike
She said, “Jude-Jude is that you?”
Jude who was very much awake yelled back, “Of course it's me - who the hell else would be calling this early in the morning?”
She looked at the clock seeing it was just after three in the morning and could not think of a soul that would be calling this early. She said, “Apparently only inconsiderate asses like you would call this early Jude. Now can you explain again what in the hell is going on?”
Jude spoke extremely quickly and knew he would sound like an insane man. He screamed it anyway, “The dead! It's the dead! They are rising, they are everywhere and they're trying to kill us all.”
Maria pulled at her hair leaning against the kitchen counter in her worn bathrobe nodding her head. She said, "Oh, of course, the dead are coming back to life, and here I thought you were going to say something that might sound, you know, a little bit crazy. I told you to get laid Jude, not go down and experiment with drugs."
Jude yelled, “Would you just look out your window and make sure they aren't in the street?”
She opened the blinds and other than a stray cat walking across the street hunting for a mouse to eat there was nothing to be seen. She said, “Jude damn it did you go out with Chuck tonight by chance?”
Jude was getting very frustrated. He said, “Look I'm not crazy and I wouldn’t believe you if you called me telling me this line of shit either, but I don’t know what to tell you. These things are walking around and they are trying to kill me. Other than sending you a picture in the mail there isn’t a lot else I can do to try and convince you of what it is I am saying.”
Maria sat on the other end rubbing at the bridge of her nose. She said, “Okay so what do you want me to do Jude?”
Jude sat there open-mouthed realizing there was very little that she could do. He said, "I'm not calling for help I'm just calling to warn ya'll okay. In the morning, I want the two of you to get your butts out of bed early and head on over to the grocery store. I want you to buy like you are shopping for an army and make sure you get plenty of stuff we can just boil with water. You get plenty of canned goods too. If I'm wrong then don't worry about it. I'll make it right with the manager somehow and return it all, you got me?"
Maria said, "I don't know if we will be able to head out in the morning Jude, it is supposed to rain cats and dogs tomorrow."
Jude yelled into the phone something that wasn't in his normal nature when speaking to Maria who was well aware of this fact. He said, "Oh for God’s sake woman would you just do what I say and trust me that I'm not completely bat shit fucking crazy, please! I need to go, I got a lot of shit to figure out, like how to stay alive and get the hell out of this fucking hotel room. Tell Patrick that I love him very, very much."
Maria said, “Call me please when you get out of that town. Christ I'm going to be up all night worried damn sick over your crazy ass, you best not be joking Jude or you are going to be getting a foot in your ass sir.”
“Maria I wish it was a joke, I really, really do. Take care of Patrick and if you aren’t sure about things you two stay put down in the basement. The key to the lock for my gun locker is in my dress cowboy boots in my closet. There is plenty of ammo down there.”
“Jude you got me worried as hell now damn you.”
“I will talk to you soon Maria just stay put after you get the food and supplies,” Jude hung up the phone staring at the three men he continued, “I think she thought we or I was crazy. I hope she listens to me though. Any of you guys got any ideas by chance?”
Pete was staring at one of them gnawing and biting on the bars he looked at their pasty colored face and when one of the very large dead turned around he saw the suit was slit up the back. He said, “Look at the guy’s suit. Do you see that?”
Chuck walked up seeing what it was that Pete was pointing out. He said, “Yeah he has a shit suit what about it?”
Pete who was putting this all together said, “Nah, I think you don’t see what I am seeing. I think he has a perfectly good suit, or at least he did at one point. When my dad was still around he had one suit and my mom always was busting his balls saying if you kick the bucket today what the hell am I going to bury you in.”
Chuck said, “Yeah so?”
"Well the one thing I always remember my dad saying was that if I kick the bucket tomorrow that I want you to just slit that suit up the back and then it'll look like it fits perfect. He said that every single time to her regardless. You know what happened the year that he died?" Pete said.
Chuck said, “She slit it up the back?”
Pete said, “Well not actually she went and bought him his first new suit he’d ever owned in his life and I bet he was rolling in his grave over it. But I think these things are the dead. I mean look at them they are all covered in dirt and wearing their best clothes. Now doesn’t that make sense to you?”
Jude walked forward looking and seeing that he had one hell of a point. He was more speaking to himself than the crew when he said, “I wonder what the hell happened to them? I wonder if the sheriff is still around to be able to help?”
Jude looked in the nightstand for the phonebook searching through the front of it until he found what he thought might be something that could help.
He said, “Okay I'm going to try and call one more place for help.”
Chuck said, “You calling the army?”
Jude said, "Nah, I don't know the number for the army Chuck, but I see in the government pages that they got a number for the center for disease control or the CDC. I think it might be a good idea to have someone head on down here and maybe check things out. I can only imagine what we will do if this shit spreads further. I mean if Pete is right, then think about it. Do you want to have to worry about every damn person as long as time has been around coming back from the dead? I know for sure that I don't have any interest in it happening. The earlier they find out about it, maybe the earlier they can start trying to figure out what they need to be doing to put these things back in their graves where they belong, if you know what I'm saying."
Chuck clapped his hands together startling the men who just stared at him. Chuck was smiling ear to ear. He yelled, "You see that? This man can think. Damn you are one smart son of a bitch, Jude. Yeah man, you call those science nerds and tell them we got us a few hundred or thousands, who knows, of these things and they ought to roll on down here and figure us out a nice way to go ahead and kill them all over again."
Pete said, “Yeah and after that, we figure out a way to get on out of here. You all cool with that option maybe?”
Roger said, “I don’t give a flying shit what you do with them as long as they die again. You can cure them and kill ‘em or you can blow them up. I ain’t going to be taking any pity on them, they were supposed to stay dead.”
Jude dialed the number in and sat back waiting patiently for what was going to sound like a completely insane story to be told. He waited impatiently while the phone rang and when he got an automated phone system he was less than surprised that there wasn't an option for the dead rising. Jude pushed zero trying to speed things up. An operator answered the phone, “Thank you for calling the CDC this is Mrs. Fullbright, how may I direct your call?”
Jude scratched his head, "Hello Mrs. Fullbright, um I don't know who to talk to? I've never called here before ma'am."
The operator said, “Well maybe you could describe the problem going on? Is it you that needs help or are you calling about someone else?”
"I'm calling about a bunch of people there is probably a thousand or more maybe?"
"Oh my. Can you tell me what is going on with them then sir?"
“They are dead, but - Christ this sounds crazy and I'm staring at it. Look Mrs. Fullbright these things, there are hundreds hell maybe thousands of them, they are dead, or at least they were dead, now they came back so I don’t know what they are at this point.”
Silence on the other end, she was looking around at the other operators screen
ing calls and flicked on her light to get help to come over to her.
She said, “Hey Larry I got a freaking wacko on the other end. I don’t know who to even transfer him to.”
He said, “The drunks always call in at night what is his issue?”
“He says there are dead people walking around. That they came back from the dead I guess? Do you want to talk to him?”
"Hell no I don't. Transfer him up to Dziegiel, let her figure out what to do with him. There isn't anything I’m going to be able to do for him other than tell him he's crazy. Send him over there. Hell if I were you I'd just say he has important information, we can deal with the repercussions later from her."
Fullbright laughed and said, “You do realize where she is going to stick her foot the next time that you see her right?”
Larry shrugged, “Sometimes that is the price you have to pay.”
Larry walked off and Fullbright called up to Dziegiel’s office. She picked up answering and said, “This is “Dziegiel’s how may I help you?”
"Hello, ma'am this is one of the operators downstairs for screening calls. I've got one here that needs to speak to you. He says there is an outbreak of some sort."
“You sure he isn’t just a crazy is he? I got more work to do than you can possibly imagine.”
She sat in her seat looking at Larry and shrugged thinking about it. She said, "Sounds pretty legit to me ma'am. Transferring."
Fullbright hit the hold and went back to Jude, “Sir are you still there? I am going to transfer you over to Mrs. Dziegiel she is in charge of sending out help and fact finders to locations.”
Jude was pacing around stretching the phone cord to its limits. "Yes, I am still here unless they eat through the damn phone poles."
“Okay give me just a minute sir.”
She hit the transfer button ringing it through to Dziegiel’s phone again, this time cold dropping him on her. Dziegiel picked up saying, “This is Karen Dziegiel how may I help you?”
Jude said, “I’m sorry what is your last name?”
She laughed, this wasn’t the first time she’d had this issue she said, “You now diesel cars?”
“Yep?”
“That’s how you pronounce it but for ease of everything you can just call me Karen, how would that be?”
“I can handle Karen. My name is Jude Grimes, this will sound - well it will sound goddamn crazy. I am aware of that and I promise I’m not crazy.”
Karen who had heard this before also wrote down on her pad of paper looney. She said, “Okay Jude, what seems to be the problem.”
“The dead are alive. They are everywhere they are flooding the streets and they are trying to eat us.”
Karen leaned back in her chair thinking of the director who had probably been the asshole that had told the operator to transfer him to her. She wasn't even sure what to say at this point she just set the pencil down tapping her fingers for a moment and thinking.
She said, "The dead are alive? Could you give me just a little bit more detail sir? This might be the first time I think in my career I've heard that. Congratulations sir it isn't often that I hear something new."
Jude said, “I know I sound crazy but if you could see what I did you wouldn’t be so quick to think that I am crazy. I know how it sounds. We were out drinking and I came back to my motel with a friend. She went out to get some ice and when she came back in she had been ripped to shreds. Her neck and her breasts and her sides looking like chunks had been ripped out.”
Karen sat forward in her seat; he now had her full attention. She’d heard crazy people before and as much as she wished this to be one of those circumstances it wasn’t. She said, “I’m sorry what happened to her the bitten woman?”
Jude said, “She died, and then less than a few minutes later she started breathing again and she - well she came back.”
“How is she now? What do you mean she came back?”
“Lady I don’t know how to explain this shit to you. I'm not a doctor, I don’t know what to say. She died, she came back, and she came after me.” Jude said.
“What do you mean she came after you?”
"She was trying kill, or eat me or both I guess. She was faster than the other ones though, I don't have that many answers for you but I assure you there is a helluva good chance the army wouldn't be a bad idea to call in. She wasn't easy to take down either."
“You killed her?” Karen questioned.
“Karen it took four of us to take her down, we don’t have any weapons on us currently. We had to use a two-by-four to take her down and until we broke her head open she didn’t stop coming. She didn’t seem to feel pain.”
Karen was taking notes more seriously at this point. She said, “I’m going to send a team of two down there to gather information. If what you say is true sir, they will most certainly call in the army and they will blow these things to hell. Is there anything in the town going on right now?”
"We don't know about the rest of town. There wasn't any time between when we took her out and when the horde of them showed up and we had to barricade ourselves up in the motel room. We are doing everything we can to keep them out, but they are going to bust through eventually. Daylight is starting to show up and we aren't going to stick around to wait for help. Me and my boys are going to find a way out and get our ride and get the hell out of here."
Karen said, “The smartest thing you can do is try and hide. If it’s that bad we will send reinforcements as soon as possible.”
Jude said, "Hiding in the middle of a fire ain't too damn smart lady. The fire is gonna get you eventually and if enough of these things want to fight their way in here it isn't going to do a damn bit of good hiding. We are going to get out of here, but we thought you might want to know about the hell that might be coming. I called home to Iowa and she said that it isn't there yet. I don't know what is making them come back but like I said, they look like they were dead. Like they came back and they are dressed in funeral clothes. Everyone is in their suits and the big men have the back of the suits cut up like they didn't fit into their dress clothes when it was time for burial."
“So there are dead rising, and if they bite the normal they die and then come back. You know the sad thing is you sound completely normal, you sure you aren’t just completely insane? It’d make this whole thing a lot easier for me to figure out.”
Jude said, "I wish I was kidding but unfortunately for you I'm not and this is really happening right now. The longer you wait the worse it's probably gonna get. I don't know cause we won't be here to find out. You need anything else from me, Karen, because if not I got to get going."
"No, unfortunately I just need to find two people to go and check this out. I appreciate you taking the time to get me the information. Good luck to you Jude. Where can I find you if we need anything else from you, sir?"
"I live in Adel, Iowa, but I'll be between here and there if we don't have enough gas to make it back."
"Well, good luck Jude. I'm going to get right on top of things now," Karen said.
“Thanks for believing me, tell them to be careful,” Jude said.
“Alright, goodbye Jude.”
Karen hung up the phone opening up the book on her desk and checking out Missouri and who she had closest to there. She scrolled down the different offices and saw two names less than an hour away from them. She called the number and on the other end a sleepy voice answered. "Hello."
Karen said, “Hello, good morning, is this Joanne Sanford?”
"Speaking, who is this, please?"
“I’m the director for overnights at the CDC. I’m actually just finishing up my shift. You need to report to Sedalia, do you know where that is located?”
“I will after a cup of coffee and I look at a map. Is someone there sick?”
"In a manner of speaking yes. It might sound crazy, but this is part of your job, a man called in saying the dead are rising there. So far, he is the only one who has called to mak
e reports, but the suns just coming up and I suspect if what he says is true, there is going to be a lot more calls coming through. I need you to call the other agent at your office and for the two of you to head down there. I need you to do it now though, there isn't any time to waste if this is true."
Joanne pushed out of bed putting her long blonde hair into a ponytail and trying to shake the sleep from her. “So dead people are walking around this town? Is there anything else I need to know ma’am?”
“Yes, he said if you get bit that you will die. Once you die you come back as one of them but that you are a bit faster than those that have been dead and in graves.”
"This was a serious call, right? I mean you don't think maybe he'd be better off with a straight jacket in a padded room?" Joanne asked.
"Well, he'd be safer there if this was true. I want a report as soon as you have the chance to roll through town. If I were you I would take it easy, don't just go flying into town scope things out before you head in," Karen said.
Joanne said, "Yes ma'am, well I'd best get going if this is an urgent matter right? I need to try and round up Kayla, this is our off weekend so I am hoping that she is home."
“Well you let me know if she isn’t available and I will see if there is anything that I can do on my end to try and help you out,” Karen said.
“Will do, talk to you soon,” Joanne said.
Joanne hung up the phone and pulled on a pair of Levis she had laid on the floor and buttoned them. She dialed her partner Kayla Youngs phone number from memory and waited while it rang. She looked at the clock seeing it was barely four in the morning and could just see the glimpses of sun cutting through the dark sky.
"Jesus could she seriously have called any earlier, God."
When the phone answered a tired, groggy voice answered. "He- hello. Who is this?"
Joanne said, “Kayla is that you?”
“I don’t know yet. I am still asleep,” Kayla said.
"Well, you need to wake up and now. There is either some sort of crazy outbreak happening or there is a complete lunatic about an hour away. The head of the CDC shift called me personally saying the two of us are in charge of going and checking it out. Isn't that awesome?" Joanne said.