The Last Days (Books 1-3)

by Julie Cooper Brown

  Besides, his nine year old son Ethan loved her. She was there for his birth, and was there to comfort him during his mother’s death. And now she was his full time baby sitter since there was literally no one to leave him with. Not that he would trust anyone else to protect his son in this situation.

  He took the CD from Pat and inserted it into the DVD player.

  “I was going to show you the footage of the three stages of Pierce’s mutation, but instead, I have something that might actually help you to come up with some kind of answer on the identity of your employers.”

  He pushed play and stepped back with his arms crossed, studying Brady to gauge his reaction.

  The video came on dark and the operator switched it to night vision. It was footage of a pile of infected that were about to be burned. The camera man neared the pile and focused his camera on one blonde woman, her body slung across the others in spread eagle fashion.

  She was completely naked and her body riddled with bites, chunks of flesh missing in various places and pieces hanging by the skin in others.

  Her eyes were still open.

  A trooper to the right of the camera lit a match and threw it on top of the pile. The gasoline that had been poured on the pile ignited with a flash.

  Brady’s face turned five shades of purple until all the color drained from him.

  “I see you recognized that person?” Jack asked.

  Brady began screaming and hopping in his chair, kicking out and trying to break free.

  “Calm down, Brady. Listen; there is absolutely nothing you can do now. Calm down and talk to me. That’s your wife, isn’t it?”

  Brady stopped struggling and his chin rested on his chest. The tears flowed steadily down his face as he thought about how he often ignored her and she had done nothing but love him and worry about their financial security. She was a great wife and she was beautiful. He didn’t deserve her in the first place.

  He could’ve done without seeing her that way. He assumed she would be at home waiting for him, he did not know that it was this bad.

  “Yes, my…my wife.” He sniffed trying to clear his nose.

  “As much as I hate to rub salt into a wound, I had to show this to you. I lost my wife a few years ago, I know how it feels. But I don’t think you understand the extent of damage to this country that one man…You… caused. Your wife would still be alive, along with a five hundred thousand or so other people, including the President and his family, if you had not thrown that sample at Dr. Pierce. If only you had not broken into his lab and picked up that dish. And we’re still counting, Brady. For every one person that gets bitten and changes, they infect at least six. Our population will be wiped out within a month. We have no way to stop it. We will be extinct.”

  Jack sat down at the opposite end of the table.

  “I have a nine year old son, Brady. His name is Ethan. He is not going to live a normal life, if he lives at all, because of you. Could you please tell me who hired you?”

  Brady leaned forward in his chair as far as he could.

  “I don’t know. I got a call from a restricted number on my cell. I answered it. The guy asked me if I wanted to make two million dollars. I said yes. He told me what I had to do. I refused at first, thinking it was a set up or a prank call. I even said as much. Then I said that when I see two million in my bank balance I would do it. When I hung up I figured that was the end of it. The next morning, I went to the bank to withdraw funds for the day and sure enough, there had been two million dollars deposited into my account. The teller had an envelope for me. I didn’t ask her who gave it to her. I was too shocked. I had two million dollars in the bank. The only thing in the envelope was the little piece of paper with the virus code. So, I came to work and tried to do it.”

  “How were you going to get it to them? They didn’t leave any other information?”

  “I don’t know. I guess they were going to call me to set something up.” Brady replied.

  “Well Brady, I think you’re telling the truth, and all I can do is let you go. I just needed to have this talk with you. Even if you did tell me who did it, it would do us no good. I just wanted to know. I needed to show you the destruction you have caused. And your Two Million… you can’t forget about that, you have no way to get it or spend it.”

  Jack unlocked the cuffs that held Brady to the chair.

  “You are free to go.”

  Brady stood up and took a tissue from the box on the table.

  “That’s it? I can go home?” He asked, puzzled.

  “You can go where ever you want. You can’t stay here. We don’t have the means to take care of you. I must warn you though,” he said as he tossed Brady a 9 mm pistol. “You’re probably not going make it too far. It’s not what you would expect. Have a great day.”

  And with that Jack walked out of the interrogation room leaving the door open.

  “You mean I’m not going to prison? You’re not going to lock me up? And you’re giving me a gun?” Brady asked as he shoved the gun in his jacket pocket.

  Jack noticed this and did not comment, but looked at him for a moment, wondering if he should feel bad for what was about to happen to this man, and decided that he shouldn’t.

  “Prison would have been a better place, yes. But unfortunately, everyone’s dead, and I’d take that out of my pocket, if I were you.” He turned and walked away.

  “Wait, how do I get out of here?” Brady asked.

  “You see those double doors? Go through there, turn left and you will see two guards. Tell them that I said to let you out.” He said and continued walking away from Brady.

  “Agent Kelly!” Brady yelled and Jack stopped without turning around.

  “Thank You!”

  “You won’t be thanking me in five minutes.”

  Jack walked to the open room where the others waited.

  Pat, his fellow agent and friend, Ethan, Jim and Dale, these two were fellow secret service agents as well.

  He sat down at the monitors, and after Pat covered Ethan’s eyes with her hands, he watched with them as Brady was escorted to the back door.

  One of the monitors had direct view of right outside the back entrance and lot leading to the garage. The dead were everywhere. The guards placed him in front of the door, gave him a card key and told him to wait fifteen seconds and open the door.

  Brady thought it odd, but he would wait. He heard the lock engage on the door the guards had went through and stood shaking his leg waiting for the fifteen seconds to be up then he swiped the card. The door swished open and he exited. The door closed behind him.

  He swiftly walked away from the building as fast as he could, taking for granted that the people he saw in his peripheral were alive as he headed toward the parking garage.

  He reached into his pocket for his keys. His pockets were empty. It was when he turned around to go back to the building to see if he could retrieve his car keys, that he noticed the people weren’t quite right. He was thinking that they were ALL fucked up. Several infected had gathered near him while caught up in his thoughts, finally noticing, he bolted for the door. He swiped the card key in the lock and it glowed bright red and beeped with each of the three attempts.

  He was able to pound on the door once and remembered the gun he had in his jacket pocket. He didn’t even get it out before the dead fell upon him. The group watching this could see him no more. The dead even fought and bit each other to get to the fresh meat at the bottom of the pile. The sound was out so they could not hear his screams; they could only see the feeding frenzy taking place right outside the door.

  Jack and the others watched this with indifference. He was the cause of all this, no one in the room felt any type of remorse.

  They were the only ones left in the entire building besides the two guards.

  Everyone else had been infected. Those they did not have time enough to destroy were all locked up other areas of the facility.

  They had only the s
outh wing to themselves and were severely worried. There was no way out and all the locks on the doors would malfunction when the generators ran out. So far, he knew that they had enough fuel to continue running at low grade for at least another month and a half. But time flies, and they would be helpless when the time came.

  There is however, an underground shelter, about 300 miles east in Walton County, with enough provisions to sustain fifty people for a year. But they did not have the code.

  Dr. O’Dey had the code, as well as the key to set off the chemical bomb that he had hastily created to kill every last one of the infected, as well as any survivors left outside the shelter.

  O’Dey came up with the formula himself. The first three weeks during the infection, doctors and engineers were working round the clock shifts to build and load the mechanisms to launch the chemical bomb from several locations around the country. Thank God, they were able to complete the tasks before they themselves were attacked and infected.

  The formula was created specifically to liquefy the brains and organs of the human race. The virus was so dangerous that that had been the only option, besides setting off nuclear bombs, killing everyone and could possibly leave the environment barren and contaminated so there would be no hope of sustaining life in this country for a time undetermined.

  They were unsure of the chemical bombs effect on the environment so far and had stopped that research with the initial loss of power. But it was all they had and they were going to use it.

  Unfortunately, Dr. O’Dey had hidden the key to the launch pad in his Aunt’s house in Florida. What was he thinking? In any case… he has a small child that was in Florida as well, having lived with her mother since the divorce and he hadn’t the time to dedicate to her because of his job. So of course, he had to get his child. He has been gone for two weeks now.

  They were hoping that they would return soon, but Jack had a nagging feeling that he would have to go out into the chaos to find him or his key.

  October 19th

  Dr. Carl O’Dey has literally walked through hell for the past five weeks.

  Since leaving the CDC, he has survived a helicopter crash, a car crash and with little to no ammo, weeks of running from hordes of zombies.

  Somehow, through all this he had managed to make Tampa and his daughter, unscathed.

  Then just when he thought he would actually make it to “safety” in time… he had gotten bitten.

  Standing in front of the sink in his Aunts home in Punta Gorda, he rinsed the wound on his arm with hot water.

  The heat felt good.

  He thanked God that he had made it to his daughter; it was just a matter of time before her infected mother would find her.

  When he entered the house his ex-wife had been biting herself. Filled with sadness and dread he shot her with one of his last few bullets as she looked up at him over her own arm, blood and meat falling from her lips. This was not the way he wanted to remember her, but it was now forever etched in his mind and there wasn’t anything he could do to erase it.

  They had still loved each other, his job just kept him away too much and he didn’t have time for his family. His wife was tired of it, so… she had filed for divorce. It was painful, but there wasn’t anything bitter about it. They remained close friends and worked out their problems. They had gotten along much better as friends than as husband and wife, and the sex had improved immensely.

  It had hurt him deeply to put her down, but he had Angel to think about so he could not give up just yet.

  He found her hiding in a toy box inside her closet. He had known that he would find her there, if not anywhere else. It was her favorite place to be when she was feeling down went there any time she was upset or hurt. How happy she’d been and hard they both had cried when he pulled her out of the toy box.

  The wound started burning and he turned the cold water on and continued rinsing. He noticed that his lips were beginning to feel a little swollen and his hands were discolored.

  He had hoped the injection he had given himself would have slowed down the process, but apparently has no effect.

  He really didn’t expect it to; he hadn’t had a chance to fully test it and was risking his life not knowing the final effects. He figured that he was gonna die anyway so he might as well give it a try.

  Angel was upstairs sleeping, and he knew he’d have to have a talk with her. This was going to be hard, saying goodbye to his little girl forever. He had no choice.

  Carl went upstairs and picked her up off the bed. She snuggled her face in his neck as he carried her downstairs. He did not want this moment to end, but he knew he was changing and didn’t want to hurt her.

  “Angel.” He said softly with a hint of tremble in his voice. She raised her head and rubbed her eyes.

  “Daddy. Where are we?” She asked looking around her and hugging her teddy bear tightly to her chest.

  “We’re at Auntie Vivian’s house, baby. I need you to listen to me. Can you do that?”

  He put her down on her feet and kneeled to be eye level with her.

  “Listen, Angel. I am going to give you something. It’s a key, one that will save your life. You understand? Daddy is sick; I’m not going to make it.”

  “What do you mean?” She asked, her eyes wide and filling with tears.

  “Angel, Daddy is going to die.” As much as it hurt him to be so blunt with her, he could not lie, she had to know. She stood crying with the teddy bear he had gotten for her birthday clutched to her chest, he pulled her into his arms and smoothed her hair. “Is it because the scary monster bit you?”

  “Yes, baby. It made me sick and I want you to be safe. Now, I have some friends. They know we are here. They will come for you, Okay? When they do, don’t be afraid. Go with them. If they ask you for the key, give it to them, but not until they ask you. I’m going to take you back upstairs; you stay there until they come. Do not leave that room, do not make any noise. You know the monsters outside? You don’t want them to know you are here. Now, let me get the key.’

  He went to the entertainment center and pulled out a puzzle as she watched. He opened the box and withdrew a small purple heart, there were little dots etched into the front.

  “Now here, put this in your dress pocket. Don’t lose it, it’s very important.”

  Angel did as her father asked and he picked her up and carried her back upstairs.

  “But where are you going?” She asked.

  “I’m gonna go find Aunt Vivian. I won’t be back, Angel. I will stay with you till you until you fall back to sleep. Do not leave this room. Angel, you mean everything to me. If you stay in this room until they come, you will be okay. “

  “Okay Daddy, I do what you say. Not leave room. And only give key if they ask. It’s a pretty key. What … Daddy what does it go to?”

  “It goes to a safe place, where you are supposed to go. Remember, only if they ask.”

  “Okay, I love you, Daddy.” She snuggled her teddy bear and burrowed under the covers.

  “I love you, Angel. More than anything I ever loved in my life. I want you to remember that.”

  Carl lay down next to her and wrapped his arm around her, and inhaled the scent of her hair. No matter how much she’d been through, she still had that little baby smell. She squeezed his hand and soon she was sleeping soundly.

  Carl gently rose up off the bed so not to wake her and shut the door as quietly.

  Once downstairs, he made sure all the windows and doors were locked. As he left the street of Spirit Lane he noticed that the dead paid him no mind.

  He thought he must’ve smelled like them or otherwise they would be attacking. He got maybe three miles away on foot before he remembered that he did not leave her with the entry code. He turned around with a sigh and headed back towards Angel, the key could not be used without the code to the shelter, and the control board was housed within.

  October 23rd

  Jack Kelly knew the clock was ticking down
, it was time to go.

  He had taken one guard and left the CDC by helicopter, he was flying it himself. He had broken into Dr. O’Dey’s office and located the address of the Aunts house. It had only taken a few hours to get there and was unable to land in front of the house without damage to the rotors, so they landed in a ball field several blocks from the house.

  Armed with machine guns, Jack and his companion had to navigate their way to the street on foot.

  Killing several infected along the way, it seemed there was a never ending flow of them and it was hell to get to the house.

  Once safely inside the house, Jack had seen O’Dey’s decapitated corpse immediately. His head lying only a few feet from the body, eyes open, mouth working, and strangely, a bullet hole right between the eyes. He should’ve gone down with that shot. Apparently not or he would not have had to be beheaded.

  Removing latex gloves from his pocket, he put them on and searched O’Dey’s pockets for the key and did not find it, but he did find a small piece of paper in his wallet with the code to the entrance of the shelter. “That’s one down, one to go.”

  He got on his radio and told Pat the code to enter the shelter and was informed that they had been attacked and Ethan was unharmed but the other guard and Jim, both perished.

  Pat, Dale and Ethan had managed to escape and were already en route to the shelter, encountering few problems.

  Pat and Dale were both a great shot, he did not worry much. He knew they would protect his son.

  He stood and looked around the house, entered the kitchen and saw empty water bottles, orange peels and granola wrappers. The wrappers were military portions, so maybe his daughter was safe, and maybe she had the key. The guard had nodded towards the stairs and mounted them to go up.

  He followed behind him and opened the first door on the left, it gave resistance and Jack pressed his face to the opening to peer in and saw the bodies of one female and one male. The male wearing military gear. Shutting the door he turned and motioned for the guard to go back down.