The Apocalypse

by Williams, T. M.

  So when I looked down at my watch to see the time, I wasn’t surprised to see that it had been exactly forty-two minutes since I spoke to my brother.

  When I looked up the Undead was backing away from the glass doors all the while, smiling at me and drooling. He lifted up a device in his hand with a small red button on it and exactly forty-two minutes and sixteen seconds after I spoke to Danny, this Undead pressed the red button.

  Nineteen

  Danny Ruiz

  In the middle of the fucking water.

  November 3rd, 2021

  My stupid bitch of a sister, Katarina, blew us up - blew almost everyone up- everyone except Sarah and some asshole missing his face. Fine. I was happy as long as Sarah made it through. Because, I wanted to fuck the living shit out of her.

  Well, except there was no living anything left in her.

  And the asshole with the missing face? He didn’t really know what was going on because he couldn’t see anything. He just floated in the water around us like a buoy, complaining that he had no eyes. That was something we figured out – we were surprisingly buoyant. So we just floated back to dry land and I was happy to see that we were nicely taking over. Of course, every once in a while you ran into some Undead who was missing a limb, or a face, or something–making them supremely grotesque. Granted, we weren’t exactly human-looking either. But something about our features really grows on you. The darkened eyes and skin like cracked marble made us look ethereal.

  “Danny.”

  Dammit, my sister was so damn fuckable. But we were in the middle of a city, in God knows where.

  Fuck it.

  I threw her up against the brick wall of a dilapidated building and pressed against her, shoving my hand between her thighs. My hands dripping with wet sludge. Not as sexy as human wetness. Hey, at least those organs still worked great. Blood or not, I was hard. Normally, in my human life, it would be about taking my time and making sure the woman was satisfied. But now, this new me only cared about one thing - my own well being.

  I pounded her as hard as I could and she screamed to my heart’s delight. I’m pretty sure I did some damage but she seemed to love every second of it. She begged for more. She got more. I have no idea how long we went for, but it was honest to goodness, the best sex I’ve ever had. Go figure – incest was fucking awesome. I just couldn’t recall what the problem was with it.

  She fell to the ground in a heap when I was done, sprawled on the ground spread eagle, giggling like a maniac. “That was fantastic Danny,” she growled, and I nearly took her again.

  “Must run in the family.”

  “That was hot,” I heard the voice from behind me and turned around to see six Undead men and women watching us with heat in their black beady eyes.

  Some part of me knew that I should be feeling some remorse about my actions, but it felt like some distant memory that I could no longer grasp. It was somewhat disorienting, but only to an extent.

  “We need to find a place to live.”

  “What’s wrong with your old place?” Sara asked.

  I looked at Sara’s hair and had the sudden urge to cut it off, just to see her reaction. Fortunately for her, I was distracted. The young boy ravaging through the pet store was creating havoc, even for the Undead. He was busy opening all the cages and letting the dogs and kittens go free, but not before screaming at them like a savage beast and laughing hysterically.

  It was then that I noticed it. The three Undead who drooled at the mouth, watching the insanity. It was then that I noticed the distinct differences.

  “There are two types of us,” I said.

  Sara looked up at me, as if seeing me for the first time.

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean, there are two types of Undead.”

  She looked toward the two men I watched and tilted her head. “You think so?”

  “I know so.” “How?”

  “Look at the way they’re standing, and they’re drooling. It’s obvious we’ve lost our conscience. But them – no it’s something else.”

  We watched them until they began fighting with each other.

  Twenty

  Sadie

  Cold Spring Harbor, New York “Doomsday”

  September 30th, 2021

  Torment. Nights and days were the worst form of torture I could ever have imagined - tormenting me with their endlessness and hopelessness. There is absolutely nothing worse in the world than what I have been experiencing for the last three months.

  I was planted in my usual spot. Sitting at the edge of my bed while my husband either did or didn’t sleep - I didn’t know, nor did I care. My blankets were twisted and crumbled behind me, evidence of my tossing and turning from the hours before. I stared at the thirsty-looking houseplant on my nightstand without really looking at it, and listened to the screams of desperation. A sound as ubiquitous in our world as the scent of death had become.

  When I thought of Mitchell, I wanted to rip my own heart out. Where was he? The screams that escaped my throat as I pounded my own fists against my skull had become normal and my asshole husband ignored them. I didn’t really notice when I had actually torn out enough of my hair that there were patches missing all over my head. I’m sure he noticed, but he never said anything. Though a part of me didn’t really blame him. The first weeks he’d cradled and comforted me, shedding tears along with me. But now, only the slightest shift in his sleeping posture indicated that he paid attention. He’d stopped paying attention.

  Now, we were prisoners. I was reaching the edge. The nights of me crying and begging until my throat became raw and my voice hoarse had ended. He didn’t understand. After all, he had only come into Mitchell’s life when I was pregnant with him. He didn’t understand. He said Mitchell might as well have been his biologically, but I knew that wasn’t true. I remember that passing look in his eyes when Mitchell was born. That look of disappointment that Mitchell didn’t look like him. It was fleeting, lasting only a blink of an eye, but I saw it. And now, night after night - and day after day, I felt it. The need to search didn’t come to him like it did to me.

  Craig told me it was time to let him go, that he was gone. Just because the Undead had taken him didn’t mean he was gone, though. I didn’t care how small the chance was that he was still alive, I needed to search for him. Living night after night, waiting for our deaths, barely surviving, wasn’t doing anything anyway. Craig wasn’t enough for me anymore and I knew.

  The lab was no longer contained and it was only a matter of days, maybe even hours before the world knew – knew about the infection spreading to the entire populace of the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory sans a few of us who were mysteriously immune. My notes sat on my desk taunting me like a dangling, rotten carrot. I don’t know what prompted me to make my next move and it definitely classified me as utterly insane – at least Dr. Ruiz would think so.

  I watched Craig for the next eight minutes, listening to the soft tick of the clock on the mantel like a beckoning metronome. Watching the steady rise and fall of his chest indicating he was finally asleep. Bastard.

  For the first time in months my senses were alive, firing all my synapses. For years we had studied the billions of neurons in our brain and it wasn’t until my partner, Lu Zhongyan, in Suzhou, China was able to manipulate the frontal lobe of the brain, that everything had become fucked up. An IQ of 182 did us no good and now the world would go to hell, my son with it. The last I’d heard from the jackass, he had just sent in his findings to PLOS Computational Biology, though I doubt they’d ever make the journal. He kept saying something about a Dr. Eugenia Ray. No matter how much I scoured the internet nothing came up about a Eugenia Ray. I was pretty sure he was already fucked in the head, taking his own shithole drugs.

  “Eugenia Ray.”

  “I don’t know what you’re saying, Lu Lu. You’re starting to scare me.”

  “Listen Sadie, I’m telling you. It’s all because of her.”

  I
paced the room with the ear bud in my ear. I suddenly felt like it was crawling and digging a space into my head. I yanked it out and switched to the internal speakers.

  “Who’s Eugenia Ray?”

  “She’s a doctor, but no one knows about her.”

  I heard a soft clicking on the phone and looked around.

  Was that a bad connection? “Lu Lu?” “Shhhh. They’re listening.”

  I stood perfectly still, afraid to move. The dead silence of the room was deafening.

  “They’re listening Sadie. Just remember.”

  Call Ended

  The sharp tone of the operator’s voice startled me.

  They’re listening. His voice kept echoing in my head but I ignored it. I knew I should care, but I couldn’t bring myself to.

  The rough carpet felt inviting under my bare feet as I walked into the kitchen and directly to what I needed. It was the first time in my life that I was so sure of what I was doing. The metal sang against the block as I pulled the blade out, welcoming in my grip. I don’t remember walking back to our bedroom. All I remember is standing above our bed for the last time and seeing my husband’s frightened and open eyes as I drove the blade deep into his chest. Believe me, I was just as surprised as anyone else when I giggled at his bubbling pleas.

  The flurries drifted around me happily as I crossed the road leaving town, completely uncaring of the crime I had just committed. I felt alive for the first time since the Undead had taken Mitchell. My purpose was renewed. First, I would find Lu Zhongyan and make him pay for his crimes and then I would somehow make the Undead pay. I’d make them all pay one by one, slowly and painfully, until I found my Mitchell - and then, for their sake – they’d better hope he was still alive and healthy.

  ~~~

  The blood stained blade sat on the passenger seat and the smell of copper mixed with the stale scent of the Buick -- my boss’s car. He no longer needed it. The air coming off the lake was brisk and bitter. Even with the heater on full-blast and my down jacket on I still shivered. I headed south on Bungtown Road toward the turnpike and then headed west.

  The phone rang half a dozen times before he picked up. “Danny?”

  “Sadie? My, what a surprise.”

  I shivered again. “Are you okay? You sound different.” “I’ve never been better. How are you this fine evening?” “Not good. Mitchell is gone.”

  There was silence on the other end of the line and I tried to picture what he was doing.

  “What do you mean gone?”

  I bit my lip, fighting back the tears. “There’s something I need to tell you. I’d tell you to keep it between us, but I don’t think it matters anymore. Where are you?”

  “Well, I’m actually in the middle of the water right now on a cruise.”

  “Oh, I’m sorry – I – uh –“

  “That’s okay, Sadie. You know that Mitchell was more than just a patient to me. You guys are like family.”

  I heard giggling in the background and cringed. He was with another woman. It shouldn’t bother me, but it did. “Yeah

  – but there’s a lot more to it. It has to do with the research we’ve been conducting out here.”

  “Do tell.”

  Twenty-One

  Adrianna Banks

  New York City, New York

  September 30th, 2021

  With each ring my mind whirled. This couldn’t be. The familiar voice on the other end of the line sounded groggy with sleep.

  “I’m sorry to wake you Dr. Ramstein but I’m afraid I had no choice.”

  “Ms. Banks? Yes, yes, what is it?”

  I could hear the shifting of the bed as he sat up and took a deep breath. “The quarantine at Cold Spring failed.”

  I heard his deep intake of breath. “Ms. Banks?”

  I nodded before answering, as if he could see me, a tear fell down my cheek. “Yes, sir. I just received confirmation.” Absent-minded, I looked at all the music notes strewn across my dining table. I missed the days at the college, teaching music. In my mind, I could still hear echoes of Brian Crain’s, At the Ivy Gate. I played it when I needed to think. I wish I had a piano right now, because I really needed

  to think.

  “Hold on, Adrianna – let me call our lab here.”

  I listened to the silence of the phone and wondered how long it would be before the contamination spread and got out of hand. A few years? A decade? What could they do to try to contain it?

  “I should have just stuck to music,” I said out loud to the empty room. If it weren’t for my father insisting that I take something real instead, I would never have switched majors to biology. How did he not know? My entire life was music. Even my mother said my fingers would be playing the keyboard while I slept. How did he not know? Now, the world was crumbling around us and I couldn’t lose myself to the music.

  I heard the line click back over. “No one at the lab is answering.”

  “How’s that possible? Isn’t there supposed to be someone always there?”

  “Yeah. Maybe they’re in the middle of something.”

  I knew he was lying. There were always three people at the lab and always one monitoring the specimens – always. “Ok, sir. Well, if you hear from them, please let me

  know.”

  “What are you going to do?”

  “I’m going to head back home. I have something I need to take care of before I head to Los Angeles.”

  “Adrianna?” “Yes, sir?”

  “You take care of yourself, okay?” “I will, sir. You too.”

  It only took a few minutes to pack my bag. It was a small duffle bag and I only took the bare essentials. I knew I most likely wouldn’t return to my flat, but it didn’t matter.

  The flight was bumpy and quiet. I must have read the documents a hundred times, hoping for a different outcome. In the mix of the documents was an article that was nearly ten years old -- a ten-year-old news article that pretty much predicted the future.

  Vaccines are causing an unprecedented number of mutations creating superbugs and potent viruses and bacteria that may eventually threaten future generations and humanity itself. Evidence continues to mount and the scientific community now admits that certain vaccines are in fact causing both viral and bacterial mutations. Ironically, the same researchers assert that “better” vaccines are needed to offset the rise in persistent mutations.

  Life-threatening pathogens are capable of evolving rapidly and developing genetic decoys that serve to disguise them from even the most powerful drugs. University of Oxford researcher, Gloria Finman, found that pathogens switch genetic material with other bacteria, but predominantly for the part of the genome responsible for making the cell coating, which is the area targeted by vaccines.

  Former post-doctoral researcher of the Center for Infectious Disease Dynamics, Germaine Summers found that vaccination led to a 40-fold enhancement of B. parapertussis colonization in the lungs. His data suggested that the vaccine may be contributing to the observed rise in immunization resistance incidence over the last decade by promoting B. parapertussis infection as well as other, formerly dormant diseases.

  In addition to the immunizations causing unknown and infinite side-effects, it was also showing a manipulation of the primordial frontal lobe cortical dysplasia. Symptoms include an increase in seizures, personality disruption, and attention deficit disorder.

  I tried calling Dr. Ramstein several times while in the air and never got a response. I had no idea then just how bad the situation was. I had no idea that the infection was already rapidly spreading. I had no idea that by the time my plane landed, Dr. Ramstein was already dead.

  Twenty-Two

  Katie Burns Tempest

  Portsmouth, New Hampshire

  December 21st, 2021

  “If I come to the door, don’t answer it. Because it will be too late.”

  The silence was deafening. I waited for him to say something more but there was nothing. Nothing but the si
lence and I almost hated him for it. He was giving up on me, on us, on our family. This was something I could not understand.

  “Richard.”

  “Don’t say it Katie.”

  I felt the heat rising to my skin, warming my face. Tears and screams threatened to tear free from my throat.

  “Katie,” his voice was strained, raw. I was almost tempted to feel guilty about that - almost.

  “Mrs. Tempest?” Zeke’s voice startled me and I jumped in my seat. I turned around, still clutching the phone tightly. “The trucks are here to pick us up. It’s time to go.”

  I nodded at him as I listened to the silence on the phone waiting for me. The soft click of the door shutting gave me peace again. “Richard, don’t do this.” My throat ached and tightened around the tears I refused to shed. “Remember what I told you?”

  I nodded, even though I knew he couldn’t see me. I

  looked up at the ugly glow of the fluorescent lights.

  “Katie?”

  “I remember.”

  “I would send for you to meet us here. There would be no leaving. If I was leaving, it would be for the wrong reasons.” “I’m coming.” I looked around the room for my keys, even though I knew there was no way of getting to the camp,

  even if I wanted to – even if he would let me. “No Katie.”

  “What happened there?” I wasn’t sure I really wanted to know. If I asked, he would tell me. That’s one of the things I had come to learn about my husband. He wouldn’t tell me the ugly – but if I asked, he would answer honestly.

  “Marcus turned.” “He what? How?”

  “He went to the surface. Instead of being killed, they turned him.”

  “What do you mean turned?”

  “The virus is evolving. The ones who are being infected now are different. They’re harder to identify as Undead. The only way you can tell is their skin looks like marble and their eyes fill with blood. But that’s it. They act completely human, except for they lack all morality.”