I asked him openly if there was anything I could do. Alex seemed to have expected the question. You could see that he cheered up straight away and admitted that he'd be happy if I joined them. He said he could see I was a decent and, most likely, trustworthy man; he'd immediately taken a liking to me. He told me in all honesty that if I joined them, the deciding power in their little group will change in favor of the good guys.
"That'll make it fifty fifty," I thought before I realized that I'd forgotten to count in Masha and Valentine Ivanovich. But Alex himself didn't seem to count much on either.
After exactly two seconds of weighing all pros and cons, I agreed to his offer. I had no plans for the future; spending some of it in the company of living human beings wasn't the worst option available. As for the two newcomers, I didn't view them as a serious threat. Most likely, the death of the children had made Alex paranoid, making him imagine things when all I could see was some petty friction.
The only thing left to discuss was the fate of my own shelter. I decided not to tell Alex anything about it and keep it as security. The entrance was well-locked and camouflaged: although after all the stories about Castle I couldn't imagine a door strong enough, I couldn't come up with anything more secure. The cellar held all my possessions — including my first diary — but I thought at the time that I could always go back for them at a later date.
So I made my decision — however doomed it then proved to be. The future seemed quite rosy, and my fabled intuition that had saved my bacon on so many occasions in the past, this time chose to remain silent. As I write this, I look back in time and can see lots of little signs and hints as Fate tried to convince me not to accept the offer. I don't for one moment doubt that at the time, it was made open-heartedly and in all sincerity, but as the saying goes, God acts in mysterious ways — using people, both good and bad, for the purposes known only to Him.
So I followed Alex, happy and relieved. Cautiously we got down from the roof and set off to the group's main shelter. I asked him what other members would think about my arrival; I could guess that Alex didn't normally take advice from anyone in making this kind of decision, but sheer politeness demanded that I ask. Just as I expected, Alex confirmed that, apart from the two "railway workers", everyone would be overjoyed to see me and that I didn't need to worry about a thing.
IX
About an hour or so later we came to what must a year ago have been an office building. Four-storied and now completely dilapidated, it stood about a hundred meters from the main road on the outskirts of what also must have once been an uptown suburb. The building was their shelter. I could appreciate their choice. The ground floor had been occupied by a bank branch, providing double steel doors with powerful locks and secured hallways, as well as barred windows and a closed yard equipped with CCTV cameras which had broken down a long time, though. Alex had said that the cellar housed the depository, a reinforced room with lockers for clients' valuables. They saved it as their last defense line, if need be.
By the entrance, a few armored vans were already turning to rust on their deflated tires. One of them was open: its savaged door hung on one remaining hinge swinging in the wind and creaking out loud. Their bulletproof windows had either been shot out or otherwise smashed.
Some of the ground-door windows bore the signs of a fierce attack: broken and boarded, surrounding walls were pockmarked by shrapnel. The house had apparently burned, but survived. In other words, it didn't differ much from other buildings around it. But at least it offered its inhabitants some quality security.
They lived on the upper floor with its executive offices, using the roof as their lookout point. They must have noticed our approach: I saw a silhouette on the roof and in a moment a powerful flash blinded me, as if directed into my eyes on purpose. I knew I was in their sights. As Alex had explained to me, he had an agreement with Valentine Ivanovich in case he brought someone else along. Alex had to make a secret sign only those two knew; if he didn't, it meant that the newcomer is an enemy and Valentine Ivanovich had to shoot him down with his sniper rifle. "Would help if he could shoot better," Alex added with a smirk.
Judging by the fact that no one shot at me, Alex must have made the sign — a secret one, indeed, because I'd noticed nothing. We entered the building and took the stairs to the third floor. Valentine Ivanovich met us there. He was a small good-natured pensioner in his sixties, his eyes lively and kind, his thick hair neatly combed. Despite the grey in it — something no one can avoid these days — he looked remarkably good considering the circumstances, healthy even: well-nourished with rosy cheeks and sparkly eyes which betrayed if not intellect, at least a good helping of streetwise smartness.
His neat khaki jacket looked as if it had just been pressed; matching trousers, polished shoes and a light-colored shirt helped create the picture of blissful serenity. But for the absence of a tie, he was the picture of a retired government official. The rifle looked out of place, though: he didn't look as if he knew what he was doing with it, holding it awkwardly, as if afraid it would go off on its own. He'd look more convincing with some gardening tool in his hands.
Alex introduced us and we shook hands. His handshake was so gentle I barely felt it. He spoke in an equally gentle voice, a soft velvety baritone, carefully choosing his words to make grammatically correct sentences, smiling all the time. He struck me as a very pleasant person. I, too, didn't seem to trigger an instant rejection in him. At first he looked a bit uptight, not knowing my business or intentions, but seeing Alex trust me, he too relaxed a little.
The only reason I describe him in such detail is because Alex had been right about him: Valentine Ivanovich turned out to be a very special person indeed. I'd love the readers of my diary to keep his full name in their memory, Valentine Ivanovich Frolov. You never know, he might have survived, in which case one of my unknown readers might meet him one day — him, or someone who has seen him. In that case, I'd love to ask you: please help him. Please do whatever it takes to make sure he stays alive. He is a very fine person, one of a kind, and it's very important that he stays alive: not so much for his own sake, even, but for the sake of all surviving humanity. In a moment, I'll tell you why.
Alex briefed him on my story adding I was on their team from now on. Valentine Ivanovich seemed quite happy to see me join. I actually think he was relieved. Probably, just like Alex, he was wary of the "railway" newcomers and didn't trust them. I expected to meet them too but they weren't around: supposedly they'd left in search of food, but Alex tended to believe it was just an excuse to bugger off to do their own thing. They left like that a lot, but it was very rare that they brought back something worth the while: normally, they just went through the motions so that no one could accuse them of not being useful or of sabotaging the task.
Masha was in her room, resting: Valentine Ivanovich told me she'd be awake for dinner time. He wondered if I spoke any English and nodded, satisfied, when I answered in the affirmative.
As Alex told him my story, he listened attentively, and when it was over, asked me a few questions. I felt he was looking for inconsistencies in my post-outbreak biography. His suspicions were understandable considering the circumstances and — especially! — the two "railway workers" who apparently had succeeded in rubbing everyone up the wrong way.
When their impromptu questioning was over, Alex told Valentine Ivanovich that he'd already clued me in on everything that had happened in their little settlement, apart from Valentine's own story, as he thought it would be better for me to hear it from himself. Valentine didn't object. But instead of just telling me his tale, he rolled up his left jacket sleeve, then the shirt sleeve and showed me his bare arm.
I froze. On his forearm, I could clearly see two symmetrical crimson blue scars, shaped as a horse shoe, one above the other. Even I with my negligible medicine skills could see they had been left by human teeth.
"It happened about a year ago," Valentine said, answering the question I didn'
t dare ask. "As you can see, I'm still alive and haven't turned into a zombie. Apparently, I'm immune to it."
Words couldn't start to describe my feelings at the sight and his words that accompanied it. I was dumbfounded; I couldn't concentrate, my head swimming with a myriad questions ultimately summed up as one: So was it really possible?
I groped for a chair and lowered myself into it. I'd never encountered, or even heard of, a single case of immunity to the zombie virus — if you didn't count Cholera, who seemed to have perished together with his jailbird buddies, which had made his particular case a pure rumor impossible to verify. But here in front of me was a living man who'd been bitten by a zombie a year ago — that is, at the very beginning of the outbreak — and who hadn't mutated but preserved his human self! How un-bloody-believable!
Valentine Ivanovich seemed to be enjoying my reaction. He promised not to abuse my patience; his story wasn't long, he said, and hopefully not too tiring. He didn't need to apologize: I was quite prepared to listen to him for as long as it took. I was all ears, catching at his every word.
This was his story: a week before the epidemic struck, he and his wife — who, like so many others, died during the very first days of the outbreak — had decided to go on a holiday break in their corporate rest house, just over ten miles from where we were now. He'd left first while his wife stayed behind to finish some sort of family business; their agreement was that she'd join him within a few days.
A couple of days later, it was pretty clear there was some big trouble in the air. Other rest house guests kept discussing the latest TV news, driving themselves and others around them to a frenzy. When Valentine Ivanovich couldn't take it any longer, he called his wife and demanded she dropped everything and came as soon as she could. The thought of her alone in the city was driving him mad: their only son had left Russia a long time to start a family in Denmark. They hadn't heard from him in those last few days.
His wife saw sense and asked him to meet her at the station. As Valentine Ivanovich stood on the platform waiting for the evening train, his trusty portable radio reported riots and shooting in the city she'd just left.
Finally, the train arrived. The doors opened, letting out screaming panicky passengers, some covered in blood. As they scattered in all directions, panic took over the whole station square and a nearby marketplace. Women screamed; men swore and shouted; at the market, fruit and veg displays collapsed, tripping up those who tried to escape.
Valentine Ivanovich saw his wife in the escaping crowd, rushed to her, grabbed her hand and dragged her away from the station. As they ran, she shouted that a group of hooligans had attacked passengers on the train and badly wounded some of them; she insisted they needed to do something: fight back or call the police and the ambulance. In the city, she hadn't had time to watch the TV or listen to the news, so she had no inkling of what was really going on. Although Valentine Ivanovich knew more than she did, he still — like all of us at the time — failed to see the bigger picture. The reality would sink in months later, when the consequences of the outbreak became apparent, but at the time, they were running for their lives as his wife nagged at him, indignant, that, being a man, he should really go back and stand up against the "hooligans".
He didn't bother to argue as he dragged her along, but they didn't get far. Suddenly, a man blocked their way, in a bloodied dress shirt; his eyes glared with madness. Howling, he reached for the wife, but Valentine stepped in his way. He tried to push the assailant aside or to hit him, but instead, the man sank his teeth into Valentine's arm. It hurt like hell; blood went everywhere. Valentine attempted to break free, but the man hung on to him like a pit bull. His wife was screaming, hysterical, hitting the "hooligan" on the head with her shopping bag.
Finally, they broke free as Valentine pushed the man so hard that he fell. They ran off without looking back and, luckily, caught up with a bus as it was about to leave the bus stop. They didn't need to ask the panicking driver to put his foot down!
On the bus, his wife tried to stop the bleeding with a dressing made out of his shirt sleeve. She did a poor job of it: her hands shook and she didn't see anything through the tears.
A few more people got off with them at the rest home: all pale, depressed and unwilling to talk to each other. Valentine Ivanovich and his wife beelined for the first-aid room, but it was locked. While other guests searched for the nurse, Valentine found a sink and rinsed the wound with water. Gradually, the bleeding stopped, and the arm felt a little numb. The wound was deep, tooth marks large and clear on the skin.
Finally, the nurse arrived, opened the first-aid room and saw to the wound: she cleaned it, applied a few stitches, covered the stitches with some ointment or other and dressed it thoroughly, not forgetting the anti tetanus shot. She also gave him a shot of painkillers and issued a few more painkilling pills in case the wound troubled him at night.
They decided to skip dinner in the rest home's restaurant, in order to avoid unnecessary questions and speculations. The rest home already resembled a troubled beehive. Not everyone had a TV set in their rooms so TVs in lounges gathered groups of excited guests discussing the latest events.
They spent the night together. They did turn the TV on at first, but all broadcasting had stopped: on all channels, there was nothing but snow and white noise. They stayed together for a while before retiring to their respective rooms: according to Valentine Ivanovich, he had a tendency to snore and preferred to sleep alone.
In the morning, a weird silence woke him up. Before that, he used to wake up every morning to a loud chirruping, but that day, all the birds were silent. He looked out of the window and trembled.
By the building wall, in a pool of thick dark blood lay a purple-black dead man, skinless. It wasn't quite clear what had happened to him. He looked as if he'd been burned — or possibly first skinned alive, and then burned. Valentine couldn't even tell if it was a man or a woman. The man was dead, but his eyes were open and attentive, calmly looking at Valentine Ivanovich. He shut the window and shook with fear, unable to control his panic.
At that moment, he said, he remembered a movie he'd seen when on a business trip in a prosperous Western country. He'd forgotten the fact of seeing it years ago, but now the shock had brought it all back up to the surface of his mind. It had been a zombie movie, and instinctively, Valentine Ivanovich started repeating the movie heroes' actions as they attempted to escape. He rushed around his room, locking windows and doors and barricading the front door with whatever came in handy.
Only after he'd locked everything he could, he thought about his wife. The door to her room was closed, and not a sound came from behind it. He was just about to open it when he heard slow footsteps: so slow they couldn't belong to his wife. "They can't possibly belong to a human being," Valentine realized as cold sweat streaked down his back.
When that someone — or something — came to the door, the footsteps stopped. A thin dark stripe showed from under the door, turning first into a spot and then, a pool — a pool of blood that kept growing.
Valentine's heart nearly stopped. Trying not to breathe, he stole to the cupboard next to the door and cautiously opened the upper drawer which contained standard cutlery, property of the rest home. He groped for the first knife he came across and quietly, with two fingers, fished it out. It was an innocent bread knife. Valentine Ivanovich took it with his right hand, blade down, and clutched it hard.
At that very moment, the door opened wide. His wife — or rather, whatever she'd become — stood in the pool of blood in front of him. Her nightie, soaked in blood, was in shreds; deep wounds gaped on her body; bloody footprints led from the opened window across the room.
Valentine froze, hypnotized by the sheer horror of it, not noticing anything but the undead in front of him, not even knowing if there was someone else in her room besides her.
Her throat was making dull gurgling sounds. Her eyes were empty. She reached out for him, her fingers outstretched,
and stepped forward, trying to catch him. Not even knowing what he was doing, Valentine raised his excuse for a knife and pushed it into her head with all his might, as if piercing a pumpkin. She convulsed and slumped onto her back, back into her room.
Inside his chest, Valentine felt a powerful bolt. He gasped for air and knew that his heart hadn't been up to it all. He somehow made it back to his night table with his medication but fell, dropping the whole contents on the floor. Already down, he rummaged through the heap of bottles for a nitro tab and poured every single pill into his mouth before the world shrank around him…
"So you see, I had to kill my own wife," he said to me apologetically. Indeed, he seemed to be the worst off among the three of us.
The rest is history. He came to in the evening and realized he couldn't stay in his room. Trying not to look at his wife's dead body, he removed his barricade and left through the front door, first into the hall, and then, outside. The rest home was empty. He came across a few bodies, totally unrecognizable, torn apart and partially eaten. Lost and at his wits' ends, he walked through the rest home gates and headed for the woods, following his nose.
He did encounter a few zombies on his way, but managed to escape. For several days and nights he walked in circles, without purpose, until he finally came across a house that sheltered half a dozen men and women who didn't even know each other.
He only had time to take care of his wounded arm almost forty-eight hours later, after some quality time in bed. It healed fine; he could already move his arm, but it looked like the scar was there to stay. He hadn't had a chance to tell anyone about the bite or show it to anyone; in fact, he couldn't have cared less about it. He told his new friends the story of his undoing — bar the bite, as he didn't consider the wound to be of any importance whatsoever.
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