Zombie Ascension (Book 1): Necropolis Now

by Vincenzo Bilof

He had to keep fighting. He couldn't feel the pain. Not now, when everything was at stake.

  "On your feet!" Desmond shouted at his brother. Jerome's safety was the only thing that mattered.

  Jerome's face was stained with blood, and the flat of his hand was pressed against one of his eyes.

  He pushed two corpses aside, while a third seized Jerome by his shoulders.

  It seemed as if hours passed during their struggle. Light poured through the open church doors. Rhonda and Vincent were on the church steps, urging them on. Desmond became acutely aware of the taste of someone else's blood on his lips.

  Adrenaline sent Desmond's instincts and willpower into overdrive. He delivered another right hook to a corpse and could feel its jaw shatter against his pain-wracked fist. He didn't look into their eyes. They were nothing to him. They were the faceless enemies that had haunted him and his brother since they were boys; they were addiction, racism, and poverty. They were the demons of sloth and avarice that threatened to drag the brothers down into the depths of Hell. He punched and pushed while ripping their greedy fingers away from his flesh. He cursed them all and lashed about wildly.

  Jerome staggered toward the church, and Desmond broke free from the crowd. He remembered Jim and Mina—they were both entangled in a web of hands. Jim fired his gun into a walking cadaver's skull, while several others closed in.

  Desmond looked to the church. Jerome had reached the steps.

  He looked back to Jim and Mina. He glanced at the church. He looked back again.

  Shit. He couldn't just leave them. No way.

  He leapt back into the fight with his fists clenched. His right hand was numb and sweat poured into his eyes, mingling with the blood that had rained upon his face from the exploded skull. He pushed and pulled the corpses away as the man with the unchanging expression downed another corpse with a bullet to the head. The gun was aimed at another corpse, but a dull click replaced the sound of the bullet racing through the gun's chamber.

  Jim and Mina broke free. Desmond turned just in time to see them rush for the church, where Rhonda still stood. She was shouting words of encouragement, but Desmond couldn't hear her over the frantic battle.

  Desmond didn't move. He was relieved to see that he saved their lives.

  Searing-hot pain burned through his shoulder as his own wet, warm blood soaked his shirt. He turned around to see a white man chewing on a mouthful of his skin. Desmond wanted to ask a question, but he wasn't sure what it was.

  The corpse was taller, and wore a white dress-shirt that was unbuttoned at the collar to allow the solid-yellow necktie to hang askew. A tuft of unruly hair sat atop his high hairline. As blood dribbled from between his lips, he seemed to smile.

  Was the man dead at all?

  Desmond's right arm was dragged behind him, as was his left. He wanted to say something profound, but as he struggled for breath, no words arrived through his parched lips. Should he scream?

  He couldn't believe that he was going to die. After everything he'd been through, why would it come to this?

  His mother had allowed her demons to bring her down. One day, her heart surrendered after a long battle with crack addiction. It was Desmond who had fought for his brother's life. It was Desmond who had struggled against the forces of fate.

  He suddenly realized what was happening to him as he watched one of the undead chomp down on his wrist. He felt like a spectator who was recording the events through a camera lens. None of this was real. Any moment, the nightmare would be over, and he would awaken to a new day. A day filled with bright sunshine, black coffee, and paperwork.

  Desmond closed his eyes and bit his tongue to keep from screaming. Any minute now…

  GRIGGS

  The streets were choked with people stumbling or rushing around. Patrick leaned on his horn several times, but most of them refused to move out of the way, as he drove his truck down corridors of flame.

  Whimpering softly, Nikki pressured an old blanket against her bleeding chest. Griggs hated to think what it might cost to get the bloodstains out of his seat. His truck was expensive, and he would be damned if he was going to let a stripper bleed all over it.

  "Watch out!" Nikki squealed.

  "Goddammit!" he yanked his steering wheel all the way to the right to avoid another wandering pedestrian who seemed to be sleepwalking in the middle of the pot-holed avenue.

  He slammed his foot on the break so he wouldn't hit the policeman who stood in the middle of the street.

  Patrick couldn't help but stare as the officer gazed into the truck with bored, sleepy eyes. The cop turned his bulging body toward the truck, the gun missing from its holster, the lids half-closed over the eyes, his arms hanging, his eyes not moving, not moving, not moving…

  And the man didn't have any lips.

  Nikki screamed again, and Patrick slammed his transmission into reverse and ripped his tires long the concrete until his back-end bounced and he jerked forward, his chest hitting the steering wheel suddenly.

  "Did you…" Nikki tried to ask.

  "No!" Griggs put his hand up. "Just a pot-hole or a cat or something. Shit! Put your seatbelt on!"

  Nikki shouted at him. "My phone still doesn't work! I'm hurting so much… please… let Danny know I'm at the hospital."

  Grinding his teeth, he cranked the truck into drive and smoked his tires again, turning his wheel so he wouldn't hit the officer, even if he had that same, lifeless expression Richard had.

  "Stop your damn whining," Griggs said. His nerves were on fire, and all he could think about was Richard's dead, horrific face. Everything around him burned, the firelight creating a mirrored lake of heat over the concrete, a superimposition of fire layered over fire. Smoke obscured the stars, and he could no longer hear the choppers.

  Where was the cavalry? Where was the National Guard?

  Was Mina safe?

  Even worse, he lost a lot of money by investing in Richard. What the hell happened to the DVD that caused it to burn up like that?

  And Richard was dead. Murdered by a bullet from his gun.

  What a fucking mistake. At the very least, he should have phoned it in. It was out of self-defense, but he didn't need to tie his lawyer up with another court case while he was trying to recover his studio's losses.

  Since Richard was dead, what was the point of keeping Nikki around? After all, she witnessed a murder! Okay, maybe all of his old buddies at the precinct wanted nothing to do with him these days, but the girl was wounded—she was damaged product. All his money and time were wasted.

  But the need to live was far more important to him. Cars were parked haphazardly in the middle of the street without their drivers. People were randomly wandering along the boulevards, dazed by the burning skyscrapers that hovered over the neighborhoods. Broken storefronts squatted in deserts of sparkling glass. Cars sped down side streets and across intersections before slamming into other cars.

  He turned up the radio to drown out the noise of an unraveling city. A male voice rumbled across the airwaves.

  "Once again, from the Department of Homeland Security, the following ordinance is in effect for Detroit: all citizens are required to seek shelter within the city's borders. No persons are allowed to enter or exit the city at this time. The National Guard and several other agencies are coordinating the quarantine while police work diligently with law-abiding citizens to prevent violence and looting in the streets."

  Griggs glanced up through the windshield and saw the lights on the wings of two military jets flying overhead.

  Another male voice disrupted the calming effect of the other man's ambiguous announcement. "But that doesn’t tell us what's going on out there! There shouldn't be a quarantine if there's just an outbreak of violence! That's what everyone's calling this! We're getting conflicted reports that... just don't make any sense at all. Why are military personnel wearing hazmat suits? There's a mini-quarantine of the Renaissance Center where they're evacuating hundreds of people, an
d I want to know why! Where are the shelters? What caused this mess? How come cell phones aren't working? There's a complete information shutdown. Someone has shut down all internet access inside the city. What's going on out there?"

  Patrick turned down several side streets just to navigate the random barricades of abandoned cars. While a few houses burned, most of the shambling people seemed to be moving toward the main streets where most of the action was. The darker streets were easier to navigate.

  "I'm scared," Nikki groaned. "Can't we call Danny somehow?"

  Griggs shouted at her. "The phones don't work! The military shut everything down. We get to hang out together for a little while." He didn't want to tell her that they might have to walk the rest of the way to the hospital.

  The deep-voiced man returned to the radio. "Everyone in Detroit has been warned to stay away from hospitals… Henry Ford and the DMC are shut down… no word on why or what happened there. According to the information I'm required to give you, those areas are not safe. Do not come into direct contact with any strangers. Do not attempt to administer first aid to anyone who is hurt. Anyone who has been harmed must be removed from any and all shelters."

  "It sounds like a virus!" the other voice protested. "Doesn't that sound like a virus? It coincides with what we're hearing. The phone lines are going crazy…"

  The former detective stopped the truck on the corner of a dark neighborhood street. He turned down the radio to silence the panic and chaos that confused his rambling consciousness. The entire block was silent and still; as with most of Detroit's suburban streets; there were no operational streetlights, though all of the homes were hardly distinguishable through the shadows which obscured them. A helicopter passed overhead, and the battle outside of his momentary bubble of silence raged on without him.

  "We have to keep going!" Nikki squirmed against the window.

  "Shut your trap! Didn't you hear what they said? No hospitals. And we're not getting out of here. I know what this is, only they're not saying. It's a virus of some kind, and if we approach any of the barricades, they're more likely to shoot us on sight. But the rest of it… doesn't make any damn sense at all. Richard had it…"

  Griggs opened his hands and stared at the road map of his violent life. Richard was dead, and Nikki was bleeding. The world stopped making a sense a long time ago: when Mina had eaten someone on his bed and apologized for it, he almost didn’t want to call his buddies. They would take her away and lock her up—the only woman who cared enough to give him what he wanted, to please him, to be happy with all of his faults and desires.

  All roads led to this moment.

  When he was a young man, he liked sex just as much as any other hormone-driven youth. He had no illusions about the future. His father had been a cop in Sterling Heights, a detective, and Patrick knew the toll such a sacrifice could have on family. The long hours of waiting. The news broadcasts where policemen were shot to death in the line of duty while working for their meager paychecks in a state that could barely afford to give raises to the men and women who kept citizens safe, no matter which city you lived in.

  There would never be enough money to equal the devotion and sacrifice a police officer made in the line of duty every day. Patrick was going to go all or nothing; he wanted to work in homicide because he didn't intend to raise a family of his own. He'd lived with the fear all his life, as did his mother and two brothers, so why subject someone else to it? His ex-wife, Brenda, may have materialized out of thin air. Marriage was almost a pre-requisite for manhood and acceptance in society, a discovery that irked Patrick. He preferred to be alone with his fears and masturbations. Marriage somehow validated your insanity. If you were married, you were apparently not likely to become a serial killer or child molester, and as long as you wore the ring on your finger, you were believed to be sane. As long as you sacrificed half your soul and half your identity, you could be counted among the acceptable members of the civilized species.

  He couldn't possibly be a bad person if he had a family to take care of. He put a roof over their heads and food in their mouths, and for the first four years, Brenda seemed to accept the fact that he wanted to work homicide in Detroit. She wanted him to see a therapist many times while he tried to rationalize his need for pornography, and when he finally relented, the doctor's words ensured he would never be normal.

  Apparently, Patrick just wanted to be surrounded by blood because as a boy, he always imagined his father's untimely death. He grew up with images of murder in his head, and this translated to his own need to be around it as an adult.

  The truth was too much for him.

  After Brenda finally gave up on their marriage, there had been several moments of doubt. He knew enough about murderer-psychology to wonder if he had it in him to do the same. Would murder finally satisfy his primal, savage lusts once and for all? Did he belong in the world of the sane and the just? Mina's timely appearance helped him realize a plan that could help him keep his life together.

  While he'd been planning the creation of his studio just to keep himself occupied, his associates began to think him more aloof and eccentric. He was told to take vacations when he didn't want to. They didn't understand that work kept him sane, but how could they understand? After the mistake with Mina, they wasted no time with his career; he was asked to resign. The chief had been forgiving, allowing Patrick a shred of dignity in the wake of his public shame.

  Mina made the national news, though Patrick was credited for surrendering her to the authorities. He was allowed to slip quietly into the background to resume the management of his studio, which has now completely bankrupted him.

  And it was too easy to kill Richard. He felt nothing for the man's murder except for the regret at the loss of his investment.

  It was easy to become a monster, and he was no longer afraid of the transformation.

  Nikki shuddered and moaned again. "I'm cold. It doesn't hurt anymore. I can't feel anything but the cold. I think I want to throw up, but not really. Have to pay the sitter… tell Danny he has to brush his teeth before he goes to bed…"

  Griggs turned the dial back up on the radio. "It's important that you do not attempt to give first aid to anyone who has been hurt. Do not attempt to leave the city. Now, we're still awaiting word where people might be able to find shelter from the riots…"

  The argument continued. "They're not riots! Why would all these callers lie? This is our worst nightmare come true! There isn't a shelter that's safe! Stay in your homes, people! Don't open your door to anybody!"

  "No need to cause a panic…"

  "Panic? This is a military operation, now! Once they've evacuated the rich, they're going to bomb the hell out of this place! You hear me? Nobody in Detroit is safe! Get in your basements and stay there, people!"

  If social order was disintegrating, what might happen to Mina? She was all alone in a cell, likely thinking he forgot all about her. In the face of his life's apocalypse, she was all he had. His kids found him revolting, and there was no coming back from murder. What were the chances the hospital was completely locked down and safe from the chaos?

  A sudden knock on the passenger window caused both of them to jump. A stranger, a black woman missing most of her teeth, pressed her face against the glass.

  He looked straight into the stranger's face and found himself wondering at the nature of man while Nikki screamed.

  "Get us out of here!"

  In his time on the force, Griggs had seen the wonders people could accomplish while on drugs. Feats of strength made possible by the euphoric sense of invincibility never ceased to amaze him. When the glass on the passenger side shattered, Griggs immediately thought of drugs. His second thought was that he was cursed; now he would have to replace the glass in his truck, and he'd have to pay for it without claiming it on his insurance.

  Nikki's head was yanked through the window, causing her back to arch and her legs to kick. Griggs held her legs down so she wouldn't be complet
ely pulled out. He grabbed his 9mm.

  The wounded stripper screamed. "Please oh GOD IT HURTS AIEEEEEEEEEE GOD! Help me please AHHHHHHGGGGGGHHHHHHHH HELP!"

  Nikki wrested her head free; blood dripped over her face from the chunk of flesh that had been ripped out of her forehead, creating a mask of gore.

  "I can't see..." Nikki breathed, her convulsing, bloody hands in front of her face.

  Griggs shot her in the skull where her flesh had been ripped away. Her head jolted back, and her body stopped moving. The face on the other side of the window chewed slowly. The black woman reached into the car, and Griggs shot her in the head, too. She dropped to the cement.

  The voices on the radio continued. "…the infection is apparently able to spread through saliva. From what we can gather with the information we have, people who have been bitten or attacked will become violent once they are exposed to the virus, and will attack others. Immediately seek shelter within your homes and stay off the streets."

  His mind no longer functioned. The radio rambled on, and Nikki lay dead against the door, her arms and fingers curled inward, her mouth hanging open while blood dripped from her red face.

  His body knew what to do. He stepped out of the truck and walked around to the other side, where he stepped over the dead black woman and opened the passenger door. Nikki's corpse flopped out and fell onto the concrete. He unwrapped his blanket from around her body, twirled it around his fist, and brushed shards of glass out of his truck. He looked up from his work for a moment and found a half-dozen or so people walking drunkenly in his direction.

  Griggs had his first thought since he shot Nikki: the black woman sure could chew without a whole lot of teeth. His second thought was he better get back into the truck.

  He didn't feel in control. He was a bystander, watching himself close the door, walk back around to the driver's seat, get in, and fire up the truck.

  "We don't know what's happening downtown, because all the scattered reports indicate nothing but bad news. There's too much confusion. Reporters are missing. Eyewitness accounts are unreliable. We do know that an epidemic of violence has broken out, and nobody is safe. Everyone can become a monster."