Time of Death 01: Induction

by Shana Festa

  Ordering Meg to stay put, Anne grabbed the frying pan from the stove and ran out to defend her husband. Meg followed her mother to the door, watching as she beat Joe into oblivion with the frying pan. She hammered away until he lay unmoving on the lawn. Then she dropped to the ground beside her husband and pressed her hands over the wound, a hopeless attempt to stop the flow of blood. Alfie was already gone and Meg gripped the kitchen counter to steady herself in fear that her legs would give out and she would collapse to the floor in a heap. Anne met her eyes as she sat in a puddle of her husband’s blood. Unable to cope with the loss, she shook Alfie over and over again; Meg could hear her crying out his name through the window.

  He opened his eyes and reached for her. In a moment of relief, her mind in denial and unable to accept the truth, Anne leaned down to her husband and wrapped her arms around him. Pressing her cheek to his lips provided all the motivation he needed to clamp down on her face and tear away a flap of skin. Anne fought to get free, but her husband’s hungry embrace made it impossible as he ripped away her lower lip and swallowed it. Her body twitched as she fell on top of him, legs kicking out with muscle spasms until she, too, fell silent.

  Alfie continued to eat away at her upper body. He rolled over, now on top of her, and dug his fingers into the mangled flesh of her once kind face. As he leaned over her, she slowly began to move. First it was a hand, and then her head lifted. Her meat now tainted by infection, held no interest for Alfie as the contagion overtook her and she reanimated completely. Alfie got unsteadily to his feet and walked out of Meg’s view, followed moments later by her mother.

  Meg sat in shock on the kitchen floor in a puddle of her own urine, unmoving for nearly a full twenty-four hours. Finally, the sound of gunshots pulled her from her reverie. She forced herself up and walked on stiff and aching legs to the front window to find the convoy passing by her home. Flinging open the door, she ran with all she had to catch them. Halfway across the lawn she came to a halt. Her parent’s finally-dead corpses lay on the lawn, heads obliterated by the impact of bullets. She stood transfixed by her family until a passing soldier guided her to the back of the transport and away from her childhood home forever.

  "What about Vinny?" Jake asked.

  "I don’t know. He called home that morning and told us he was coming home. They had been called back to the states for something, but they didn’t tell them what. He never called back. I’m really worried. What if he tries to go home? What if we never see him again?" That meant Vinny was back on US soil and fighting on home turf. I thought back to the soldiers lost during the trip to Target and stuffed down my fears that he’d met the same fate. Vinny was Vinny. He’d make it through this. I just had to keep telling myself that for my sake and Jake’s…and now Meg’s.

  * * *

  Chapter 12

  Gone Fishing

  Out of the sixty soldiers we joined forces with, only thirty-two made it back to the Target compound. Lieutenant Dan (pronounced in my head Day-an) held a small service for his fallen men. All were in attendance. Our group now totaled fifty-one soldiers and twenty-eight refugees. Seventy-nine people, against 150 thousand the odds were not in our favor. After a moment of silence, Lieutenant Dan called the group to order.

  "I know many of you have questions. The simple truth is that I can’t answer most of them. We’ve lost communication with forward operating base, cutting us off from intel. Last report from Captain Crawford informed us that this thing had spread as far west as Nebraska and all the way up the Eastern Seaboard to Canada." I felt a sting in my chest as I thought of my parents in Massachusetts.

  "Sir," interrupted Jake. "Who is the ranking officer here?"

  The lieutenant fixed him with a steely gaze, "You’re looking at him. Armed forces from all branches have been called back from overseas and are expected to make ground in Washington over the next few days. I know of two other platoons in Southwest Florida but have received no reports since early this morning. At this point, I have to assume they’re gone, and we will receive no aid until our boys land and begin fighting this war to win our country back."

  Adam stepped forward. "Do we know how this started?"

  Sighing heavily, the lieutenant shook his head. "Son, I have no intel on that. We’ll need every man, woman, and child to contribute here. Not only for our safety, but for everyday living. The barricade must be manned at all times, meals need to be made, living accommodations set up, and so forth. Every resident will need to put together a bug-out bag. In the event we need to make a hasty retreat, that bag may very well be your only source of food, water, medicines, and clean underwear."

  The crowd erupted in chaos. Questions were yelled out; many people broke down in tears, men and women alike. The pregnant woman, Noelle—I had come to learn her name—stood next to her husband as he shielded her protruding belly like he could somehow protect the precious cargo from all that was happening. Jake stood next to me with his arms around a crying Meg. As the crowd broke, he led her into the store, and they huddled together on one of the display sofas. His eyebrows raised in question when I didn’t fall into step with them.

  "I’m going to look around the store and find us some new clothes." We were both still clad in the over-sized items pilfered from our last safe house. Looking down at my dirty, exposed legs, I’d be glad to burn every item on my person and get into something clean. I browsed the women’s section and settled on a pair of blue jeans and a plain purple tee shirt, picking out a black bra and panties along the way. In the shoes section I picked out the most comfortable pair of running sneakers I could find, then I went into the dressing room.

  As I undressed, the events of the last few days bombarded my mind. I sat in silence in my self-imposed solitary confinement of the dressing room and cried.

  I held Daphne and ran my hands through her silky fur. "I miss them, Daph." I cried into her little body.

  "I don’t even know what to feel. My parents so far away; Ollie so close. Am I supposed to grieve? To just assume they’re dead?" She didn’t answer me, but I felt a bit of my burden lift as I spoke the words.

  Visions of Officer Donnelly, Alicia, Kat, and Jake’s parents cycled through my head. I whispered a soft goodbye to them as I tasted the salty tears that stung my cheeks.

  I made my way out of the dressing rooms and discarded my dirty clothes into a bin meant for items that were to be returned to their shelves. No one would be putting those clothes away at the end of their shift. As I browsed the aisles to pick out clothes for Jake, I came across Adam. He was standing at the end of an aisle, fingers brushing a plush teddy bear. Seeing him felt like an invasion and I turned to leave him to his private moment.

  "Emma, right?"

  "Um, yes. I didn’t mean to interrupt. I was just looking for some new clothes for Jake. I can look somewhere else."

  "No, don’t. I could use some company." He looked back to the teddy bear. I couldn’t read his face.

  "Gabby will love that." I nodded in the direction of the toy.

  "What? Huh? Oh." His arm dropped to his side. "It wasn’t for Gabby," he said so low I could barely make out the words. "My daughter’s name was Janelle."

  I inhaled quickly, trying to find a way to answer him. "I’m sorry," was the only thing that came out. What could I say? One of my instructors used to tell us if we looked up sympathy in the dictionary we’d find it between shit and syphilis: three things that no one wanted. Since then I had always shied away from telling people that I was sorry for their loss. I worked on being empathetic as opposed to sympathetic, but empathy meant I needed to share the feelings of another. I hadn’t lost a child, so I couldn’t empathize with Adam. Quickly changing the subject, I blurted, "Thank you, by the way."

  "For what?"

  "For stopping for us. We wouldn’t have made it much longer in that car, which means we wouldn’t have made it at all. You did a good thing today. You saved six lives." I looked to Daphne and corrected myself. "Seven."

  Adam
looked to his feet and kicked at an imaginary rock, his discomfort at the compliment causing his cheeks and neck to flush.

  "I really need to get back to Jake and his sister before they get nervous," I said.

  I started back to Jake, turning around one last time. "I’m sure I’ll see you around," I joked, and beamed a sincere smile at him before turning the corner.

  * * *

  One of the benefits of living the coastal life was that many big name stores and supermarkets, Target included, sat on waterfront property. Shoppers could drive up in their boats and tie up to do their shopping. The main advantage to this was it provided us with a defensible area. A cinder block barrier more than seven feet high ran from the back of the store to the water’s edge on both sides. The other side of the canal faced a row of homes. Our presence had not gone unnoticed, and the edge of land was lined with a horde of undead. With no chance they could reach us, the scene was less fear-inspiring than it should have been. Dead moans carried over on the breeze. I found myself sitting at one of the patio sets we brought outside. Lounging in one of the reclining chairs I gawked at the single-minded beasts.

  It never failed. A new addition would push their weight into the foray and plop; the front line would fall into the water and get pulled under, to be carried away with the current. Sometimes, I pretended to cast a fishing line out and reel them in when they tumbled into the water.

  * * *

  We quickly fell into a routine. The soldiers would leave each morning at dawn to search for more survivors. Jake and I stayed back with Meg and the others, performing menial tasks around the store. The rotting meat section had started to reek like week-old roadkill in the dead of summer. Myself, along with Jake, Adam, and the Talbots took on the chore of emptying the molding deli section. After filling shopping carts lined with plastic shower curtains, we carted them out the back door where a second group waited to dump them in the canal. A third group wore painting masks and cleaned the shelves with bleach upon our completion.

  Jake found it comforting to fall back on his military training and began taking shifts at the barricade. Meg put her psych degree to good use, providing an outlet for many of the survivors to process what horrors they had seen. We all suffered from post-traumatic stress in one way or another.

  Another thing I noticed about Meg was that she spent a lot of time with one of the soldiers, a good-looking kid who was well-liked by the others. Will, she told me, was also twenty-one, and she really liked him. I don’t know where this generation got their slang for dating. I’d lived through terms like going steady, dating, boyfriend and girlfriend, but it seemed the new way to say it was talking. So Meg and Will were talking. Whatever that meant. She said she was keeping it casual, but this was no big surprise. She had always distanced herself emotionally from getting too involved with guys. Her first serious relationship began at the end of her senior year of high school and lasted through her first year of college. He wanted to get serious, and she didn’t want the hassle. Meg was gorgeous. Like all the Rossi kids, she had dark hair and big brown eyes. She was also pint-sized and had a perfect body. She invested a lot of time working out and staying in shape. I guessed she was probably the best looking girl left alive.

  The center of the store became a tent city. People slept in groups for fear of being alone. Jake and I had set up our own tent on the fringe of the group. He avoided talking about his family. "I’m sorry I was such an ass about Daphne. I deserved that left hook." He touched his jaw and pretended that it hurt. I slapped him playfully.

  "At least you’re finally admitting you’re an ass," I joked back. The realization that life as we knew it had been so severely altered, I forced my feelings of resentment to the depths of my being and made the conscious effort to forgive his cold betrayal.

  His face turned serious. He gripped my face in his hand and drew me into a kiss. "I couldn’t bear losing you. You’re everything to me."

  "Me, too, baby." I snuggled down with him. The store was dark. Lit only by an LED lantern at the center of our makeshift camp. Barely able to make out his features, I laid in his arms. Daphne snored softly beside us as we drifted off.

  Nights were difficult for everyone. The sounds of people crying themselves to sleep haunted each and every one of us. Jake had taken the news of his parents hard. Instead of letting it out, though, he took out his rage on the undead that wandered too close to the barricade. He began spending more time on the wall than with me inside. I missed my easy-going, funny husband. I don’t know why I wasn’t falling apart, I just wasn’t. I put my limited nursing education to good use, caring for boo-boos the kids would get playing, and diagnosing dehydration on numerous occasions. Gabby had taken to following Adam around. His hesitation was obvious only to me, since he refused to talk about himself to the others. Our brief conversation had been the only time he had let his guard down.

  Margie became the den mother of sorts. She corralled the kids and kept them out of trouble. Most of the kids were alone, families having perished in the initial outbreak. The first few search parties had rewarded us a total of twelve new survivors. Margie and the Talbots took on the role of welcoming committee, introducing the new arrivals to everyone and helping them get acclimated to the store. The survivors were zombies of another kind. Bodies emaciated from days without food. Wits frayed by all they had seen.

  I spent the morning getting to know Finn and Noelle Jamison. Noelle was three weeks into the eighth month of her pregnancy. The couple got married the year before and this was to be their first child. Finn was a numbers and statistics guy. He worked for a small accounting firm in town and had the stereotypical rigidity expected from a CPA.

  Noelle was the polar opposite. As a Kindergarten teacher, she was patient and easy going. The day of the outbreak, they were returning home from a prenatal visit. Twenty minutes after learning their first child would be a bouncing baby girl, they heard the news reports on the radio. As Finn leaned over to raise the volume, a woman ran into the street, and directly into the path of their oncoming vehicle. The pair wouldn’t, or couldn’t, elaborate on their experience. Finn was too scared that reliving the details would cause undue stress on Noelle and their unborn child. Clinically, I agreed. I did what I could to make her comfortable and kept a watchful eye on her.

  Sandra, one of the newest arrivals, did nothing but cry. She turned down multiple attempts from the group to talk, or even just allow one of us to sit with her. Isolated to the farthest corner of the store, she remained withdrawn and emotional. Barely touching the food we brought to her, she looked like a rag doll in her oversized summer dress. On her sixth day with us, she stopped crying altogether and went catatonic. We took turns checking on her, careful to provide her with enough space.

  The following day, the smell of shit hung in the air as I walked over to Sandra’s corner. She was laying in the fetal position, urine and feces puddling around her from under her skirt. Cautiously, I approached. Her back was to me and the last thing I wanted to do was startle her. "Sandra, it’s Emma. I wanted to see if you need anything." The smell intensified the closer I got and I choked back a wave of nausea. Drawing on my history with code browns, I put the odor out of my mind and continued.

  Stopping a few feet away from her frail figure, I called out to her again. No response. Stepping closer, I saw no rise and fall of her chest. I could make out something round by her head. As I circled her still body, I realized it was the cover to a pill bottle. Three bottles lay open and empty in front of her. I knelt down, my eyes watering from the strong smell of urine, and touched her cheek. She was cold to the touch and I instinctively felt for a pulse, knowing I would find none.

  My first instinct was to scream for help. I stopped, thinking of the fear that screaming would bring the others. There was nothing to do for her at this point. She chose the escape of suicide, her pain too hard to live with. We knew nothing of what she had seen. The only word uttered since her arrival had been her name.

  Jake was on
the wall. I found Adam playing fetch with Daphne. She had really taken to him. I wondered if she had become a comfort since he’d lost his daughter the same way she had always been with me for never having had a child at all. I scooped her up and gave her a kiss, handing her to Margie who was reading a book to the kids. "Child, you stink to high hell," she said as she used one hand to squeeze her nose and the other to take Daphne.

  "Adam, I could use your help with something." I led him toward Sandra’s body, stopping along the way to grab a cart and a set of sheets. Thinking more clearly, I doubled back and grabbed two sets of rubber gloves. His eyebrows rose at my shopping list.

  "Seriously, Emma, I hate to break it to you, but you really do stink. Don’t get offended, but did you crap yourself?"

  "You caught me. But hey, thanks for that. I’ll be sure to pay closer attention next time." Rolling my eyes at him, I shook my head. "It’s Sandra, not me. She, um, took the blue pill. Apparently Wonderland wasn’t her cup of tea." I could tell my Matrix quote was lost on him.

  "She killed herself, Adam. I didn’t want to cause a panic. I thought we could discreetly put her in the cart and cover her with the sheets."

  Mouth agape, Adam asked the obvious question. The one I didn’t want to answer for fear of sounding barbaric and callous. "And then what?"

  "And then I thought we could take her to the canal and give her a burial at sea." I don’t know why I held my breath waiting for his response. I didn’t want him to think badly of me. "Unless, you’ve got a better idea?" I really hoped he did.

  We unceremoniously dumped Sandra into the canal and watched as the white sheets around her billowed down into the dark depths. Our cheering squad still stood en masse on the other side of the water. I flipped them the bird before turning back to the store. "Cleanup on aisle three," I muttered under my breath and went about cleaning the floor of the excrement that had evacuated Sandra’s body. My callous reaction was enough to give me pause. I questioned my lack of compassion and how, in just a few short days, I had been left feeling cold and empty.