Jane Zombie Chronicles Box Set Books 4-6: Crisis Cell, Ominous Ordeal, Running Rampant (Jane Zombie Box Set Book 2)

by Gayle Katz

  The injured woman on the ground tries to get up, but she’s having trouble and holding her leg in pain. The horde of zombies surrounds her.

  I want to help, but if I end up sacrificing myself for this stranger, Jack doesn’t have a chance. Not knowing what to do, I stare and see if someone else will help her. No luck. The zombies move in for the kill, stumbling over one another to get a piece of her. I can’t see her anymore. I can only hear the zombies groaning.

  Her screaming gets louder and is ear-piercingly shrill. No one is coming to her rescue. Dammit! I can’t watch this woman die. I can’t.

  I decide to run over to help, but the cab driver grabs me by the arm. “No! Let go of me! Someone needs to help her!”

  He ignores my command and shoves me into his taxi, locking my door. He then jumps into the driver’s seat, locks the rest of the doors, and whisks us away from the chaos.

  As we zoom away in his beat-up, old people mover, we get stuck in a bit of traffic since others want to escape the zombie outbreak too. I can still hear the woman’s screams. I see more zombies join the group surrounding her, blocking any chance of her getting away. Other monsters join in on their newly caught feast. Staring out of the back window of the cab, all I can see is a growing red stain on the dull, dingy street.

  A team of people in military garb bust out of the airport doors with assault rifles in hand. They’re in a circle formation so that they have eyes everywhere. No surprises. They start shooting into the crowd of zombies. Aiming for the head, I see skulls explode in a mess of brains and blood. The woman who they were feeding on rises from the grisly scene before them, ready to attack. Without hesitation, they shoot. The bullets slice her head in half while her body twitches and falls to the ground.

  I look away from the bloody mess and start to cry.

  “W-Why did you do that? Why did you pull me away? I could have helped her.”

  “No. No, you couldn’t,” the driver replies. “You hesitated. Her fate was sealed.”

  “You don’t know that!”

  No response.

  As I slump in the back of this guy’s stinky cab, I know he’s right. Maybe I could have saved her if I had acted sooner? I don’t know, but I just hope I don’t make the same mistake when it comes to Jack.

  “Welcome to Maharabad,” he says. “Crap like this happens all the time. You can’t save everyone.”

  ***

  Sitting in the backseat of this dirty taxi, I’m silent. I don’t know what to say. This trip has been a disaster from the start. My mind goes back to what the security checkpoint guard said to me about this place. Then I think about Jack. And those innocent people on the plane. And the woman on the street who was scared to death when she was trampled, eaten alive, and turned into a zombie.

  “I wanted to help her,” I tell the stranger driving me.

  “Uh-huh,” he replies.

  I thrust my arm between the front seats so he can see my bite mark. “I’m immune. I was bitten a long time ago and received treatment. They couldn’t have hurt me.”

  “Come on, little girl. Those monsters would have torn you apart. Sit down, shut up, and enjoy the ride.”

  “Where are we going?”

  “Where you asked to go.”

  “But I can’t pay you. I already told you that.”

  “Don’t worry, little girl. It’s good karma, and sometimes that’s worth more than money.”

  Appalled by his demeaning “little girl” language, I decide to keep my mouth shut. I’m in his country. He saved my life. He’s doing me a favor by getting me where I need to go. I’m basically naked in this horrible disaster of a place. No ID. No money. No nothing. I look up at the torn fabric ceiling of the cab and close my eyes. I just want to track down Jack and bring him home. That’s all.

  After a moment, I open my eyes and stare out of the windows to get a sense of my surroundings. All I see are unkempt buildings on the verge of becoming rubble. Hell, some of them are already rubble. The whole area is a dirty, dusty, and polluted wasteland.

  There’s no more conversation between me and my cabbie. He just drives in silence. And then the car stops.

  “We are here.”

  I look out the window, oblivious to my surroundings. “Where are we?”

  “This is your stop, little girl. The club, Ariyana.”

  I open my passenger side door and the wind blows dirt into my face. I wipe it away with my hands and my sleeve as best I can, but my sweat helps it stick to my skin. I can only imagine what I look like with dirt smeared across my face.

  I step out of the cab, close the car door behind me, and the cab speeds away. The sun is still brutally strong. I look up and see a sign for Ariyana. That’s not all I see. I get an eyeful of what’s likely inside the club: the sign features two naked ladies gyrating around a man.

  “I guess this is it,” I mumble.

  Staring at the sign, I feel sick to my stomach. I’ve come all this way. I might as well go inside.

  Chapter 7

  ________________________________________

  I open the front door and I’m blind. Darkness surrounds me. The bright light of the cruel sun leaves me momentarily unable to see. Not knowing what’s ahead, I stop for a moment, close my eyes, and try to acclimate myself to this new, much darker environment.

  I hear people talking in another language, but I ignore them and continue to focus my eyes. I blink once, twice, and then my vision starts to come back. I see a big, husky man approach. He says something, but I don’t understand.

  “You speak English? Pay money,” he says.

  “Right. The cover charge to get in. I can’t pay you. I lost my stuff on the airplane getting here. I had money, but it’s gone now.”

  “Then can’t come in. Leave.” He starts to push me toward the door.

  “No. No. No. I’m here to see the Rat. He’s expecting me,” I blurt out.

  “Fine. Stay here.” He then takes out a pair of handcuffs and clicks one on my right wrist.

  “What are you doing?” I try to pull away, but he’s much stronger than I am.

  The bouncer ignores my question, pulls me toward a pole, wraps my arms around it, and clicks the other cuff on my left wrist. “Stay,” he tells me as if I’m his dog.

  “I’m wrapped around this pole. Where could I possibly go?”

  As he walks away, back into the darkness of this hellhole, I pull against my shackles. I feel the sharp metal edges start to dig into my flesh and I wince at the pain. Despite my efforts, the cuffs are too small and my knuckles are too big to slip out of them. I look up at the pole. Even though I’m handcuffed, maybe I can slip them off at the top, but no luck there. The pole goes all the way up to the ceiling. I start hyperventilating, getting nervous, but then realize what I’m doing and try to calm myself down. The cuffs are on for good. The only way they’re coming off is if someone releases me or I get the key.

  “Just be cool and see what happens, Jane,” I whisper to myself.

  As I stand there, a prisoner of this crummy strip joint, I begin to take in the sights and smells. I see women dancing on platforms. Most of them are completely naked. Others are covered by fabric as small as a washcloth. As my eyes begin to adjust even more to the dankness, I notice some of these women look strange. One woman has a scarred arm. Another one looks like she has a bloodstained leg. Both are wearing muzzles. What’s wrong with these women? They’re acting human, for the most part, but they look as though they are or were in the process of turning into zombies. And they’re chained to the stage. Whatever they are, they can’t get far tethered like that. How can someone live such a tragic life? I don’t understand this place.

  Processing all this information is overwhelming, but then I’m accosted by a smell so horrible. I try to hold my nose, but I can’t reach my face with my hands cuffed around the pole. I start breathing through my mouth, but I can still taste the foul funk in the air. It’s heavy with the stink of alcohol and something else abhorrent.
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  One of the dancing ladies spots me staring at her, gets off her platform, and walks over to me dragging her chains behind her. “You’re new here,” she says in perfect English.

  “New? Yes.”

  “You’ll do fine.”

  What is she talking about? I don’t work here. “I don’t understand.”

  “You have scars just like me.” She points to the bite mark scar on my arm and then presents her arm to me.

  “How did you get here?” I ask.

  She looks down at the ground.

  “Why are you here?”

  She sees the burly bouncer returning to his post and begins to walk away from me. “I have to go.”

  “Why are you here?” I repeat louder. “Answer me!” I stare at the big guy as he gets closer to me. “Who is that woman? What did you do to her? What happened to her?”

  “Your story checks out,” he says, as he searches his pockets, ignoring my questions. “Go sit by the bar. Order a drink. On the house.” He points to the bar on the other side of the club.

  “I don’t want a drink. What I want is to see the Rat. Now! I’ve come a very long way and need to speak with him. It’s urgent!”

  “You don’t give me orders,” the bouncer says as he gets in my face. “I give you orders. And my order is for you to sit at the bar and have a drink, that is, unless you want to stay chained to the pole. Your choice.”

  “Fine.”

  The bouncer pulls a key from his pocket and inserts it into the locking mechanism for the handcuffs. He turns the key and the cuffs pop open. I pull my arms back, rub my wrists and walk over to the bar.

  I stare at the woman who spoke to me, but I don’t dare go over to her. I can feel the bouncer staring at me. His eyes following my every move. If I want to save Jack, I need to do a better job of not pissing off anyone.

  As instructed, I take a seat on one of the wooden stools. The female bartender approaches and asks me what I want. Half of her head is wrapped up. After spotting the dancing ladies deformities, I’m not eager to see what’s hidden under her wrap.

  “Drink?” she asks.

  “Um. No thank you. I’m just waiting.”

  “I suggest you get something. It’ll help preserve your body from anything you contract while you’re here.”

  “Contract? What am I gonna contract?”

  “Just drink,” she says as she pours a clear liquid from an unlabeled bottle and pushes it over to me.

  “What’s this?”

  “Just drink it. It’ll take the edge off.”

  Everything in my being is telling me not to drink it, but I want to do as they say because I want Jack back, so I kowtow. I pick up the shot glass, inspect the clear liquid one more time, bring it to my mouth, and drink it down in one gulp.

  “Ahhhhh! That burns,” I cough, dripping some of the drink down my chin. “Is it supposed to do that?”

  “Yeah. You’re fine,” the bartender says. “Have another.”

  “No. That’s OK.”

  She pours another drink anyway. I don’t reach for it. One is my limit. She pushes it over to me. I feel compelled to follow her suggestion, so against my better judgment, I drink it down.

  “How does it feel now?” she asks.

  “It doesn’t burn as much,” I reply.

  “That’s good. They get better the more you drink.”

  As I sit there on the bar stool and let the alcohol seep into my bloodstream, my arms and legs begin to feel rubbery. I hold my hand up in front of my face and stare at it. Do I have six fingers now? No. That can’t be. I only came in with five on each hand. I try to concentrate, but my brain is scattered. I just got my vision back and now it’s all blurry.

  I look up and see the bar has a television perched high above our heads. It looks like the news is on, but it’s in the Arabic dialect I’ve heard everyone speaking. It’s the traditional anchor sitting alongside a changing image illustrating the topic of discussion. In some cases, they cut away to video footage and other people speaking another language I don’t recognize. While I don’t understand what they’re saying, I do see footage of zombie outbreaks and people running and screaming. In one case, the footage is of zombies stumbling around consuming people. I wonder how they’re getting this footage. It must be awfully dangerous.

  It’s frightening to see these victims in their dead states and even more distressing to see them reanimate only to attack other innocents. In another clip, a zombie lurches forward and attacks the camera person, who is trying to get the story but still keep a safe distance. Unfortunately, there’s no safe distance when it comes to a zombie outbreak. These primal killing machines never stop.

  The camera drops to the ground and all you can see are people running and screaming until someone crushes the camera and the video feed goes dead. Teary-eyed after witnessing more carnage, I look down at the bar and close my eyes to mourn the dead. “When will this nightmare end?” I whisper to myself.

  The news segment ends and commercials start playing. It shows a woman who is bitten by a zombie, but she doesn’t look worried at all. Then it cuts to an image of a needle. I guess it’s for a zombie vaccine? A cure? The camera then focuses on an older man who walks into the commercial as if he owns it and introduces himself in English as Scott Cameron Roberts. It closes only with the name Scrycor.

  Scrycor is sure an odd name for a company, but for some reason, I feel as if I’ve heard of it before. I just can’t remember when or where in my current state of mind.

  “What’s Scrycor?” I decide to ask the bartender, as I blink my eyes to clear the blurriness and recover from shedding tears.

  As I look up and stare, I see twin bartenders waving someone over. Within seconds, another meathead thug is approaching.

  “Now what?” I mumble.

  He puts his hands on my shoulders. “Come with me, Jane,” he says. I guess that means it’s time to go.

  “How do you know my name?” I manage to eek out despite my drunken stupor.

  “We’ve been expecting you,” the man says.

  “Are you the Rat?”

  “No. I’m taking you to him. He wants to see you.”

  I look at the bartender and say my good-byes. “I’d tip, but I don’t have any money. Someone stole all my stuff.”

  “I know,” she replies. “Don’t worry.”

  “You know? Wait. How do you know that?” I ask as I dig my fingernails into the decrepit bar. I want to stay and find out more, but the thug is yanking me off my seat.

  “Don’t worry about that, either,” she adds.

  Don’t worry, she says. With everything that’s happening, how can I not worry?

  Knowing I don’t have many choices, I try to shrug my shoulders to loosen the thug’s grip on me. No luck. “Get off of me! I’ll go when I’m ready,” I say.

  With that, I get up from the stool, but my legs are wobbly and I lose my balance. I guess the liquor is hitting me harder than I’d originally thought. The thug catches me and prevents me and my rubbery limbs from falling to the grimy floor.

  “Can you stand or do you need me to carry you?” he asks.

  “Don’t be silly. Take your hands off of me. I can stand.” I shove him away.

  “Fine. Get in front of me so I can keep an eye on you,” the thug says as he physically guides me toward the back of the club.

  I walk with him, doing my best to stay on my feet. As we leave the main bar area and enter a dimly lit hallway corridor, I use one of the walls to steady myself, dragging my fingers along the wall to maintain my balance. My hand touches something sticky. Whatever I stuck my hand into is all gummy. Yuck. I wipe whatever it is on my pants.

  We walk deeper into the hallway maze until my escort stops in front of a door.

  “The Rat will be with you in a moment. You’ll wait for him in here.” He pushes the door open and waves me in.

  I enter the pitch-black room and again my eyes need to adjust. I walk around in circles for a moment or two
, confused. Focus on Jack. Focus on Jack. Everything is fine. As I calm myself down, I hear something. It sounds like air-conditioning, but this godforsaken place doesn’t have anything of the sort. There’s a new aroma in the air. As I inhale it, it smells sweet. I stumble. What are they pumping into the room?

  “Let me out of here!” I yell.

  I’m getting tired so I try to find the door so I can bang on it and get someone’s attention. It’s too dark. I can’t find it. I stop moving and fall to the floor. Sleep begins to overtake me. I try to fight it. Everything goes black.

  Chapter 8

  ________________________________________

  When I come to, I’m face down on the floor. I open my eyes, but I can’t see anything in the darkness. My whole body hurts. I try to use my arms to prop myself up, but they’re tied behind my back. Instead, I roll over and pain jolts through my head down my spine. My neck is killing me. If I stay still, I can feel my blood pumping through it, as if it’s going to explode. This is probably the worst hangover headache I’ve ever had, but from only two drinks? I try to stand up. I can’t. As I roll over again, I can feel my left arm is throbbing. Despite my restraints, I manage to get to my knees. I hear something behind me. I turn around. I’m not alone.

  “Hello?” I say to the darkness. “Is anyone there?”

  Upon hearing my noises, the lights flip on. They’re too bright. I’m temporarily blinded as my eyes do their best to adjust again. I’m squinting to see anything. Someone grabs me by the collar of my shirt, picks me up, and sits me in a chair.