ZOMBIE WORLD ORDER

by P. J. Kelley

  Keisha spoke up, “I’m going as far as the Bronx, so I’m sticking at this point.”

  Al and David in the back said nothing. The others just assumed that they would lie due to their legal status. They were right too; the smart move for them was to play this pretty close to the vest, and then run at the first opportunity. However, David was kind of keen to go, believe it or not. This whole thing was extremely entertaining, especially when compared to a jail cell. Plus, he liked the company. Being around alcoholics and drug addicts was relaxing, he was finding. Naturally pretty selfish people, they were so focused on themselves, especially in a crisis, that they weren’t especially interested in pestering him.

  David had always enjoyed being around people, but mainly as an observer. The outcome of the trip was unimportant to him, really. He was a philosopher, which means that compared to the age of the universe, he had a tendency to think the human condition was of fleeting temporal importance. He did understand why others lacked his perspective, since there had been a time when he had lacked it as well.

  Al said absolutely nothing.

  One of the three new arrivals, a tense looking young man in a Mets cap suddenly spoke up, directing his question to Bridget. “Where are you going to go?”

  “Home,” said Bridget. “My family will just have to deal with me. This is a crisis.”

  “Where is home?” the newcomer asked.

  “Woodside. In Queens,” Bridget answered curtly. The newcomer lapsed back into silence, but the girl next to him started at this. She was Asian-American, seemingly of Japanese origin, a disheveled person for whom an untidy appearance did not seem to be her normative state. “Have you been watching the news?”

  “No,” Bridget almost smiled, “I have been indisposed. What did I miss?”

  The young man next to the Japanese girl nudged her, still looking straight ahead. The girl seemed to pause, and said, “There has been a lot going on. I’m Jen, this is my friend, Jorge,” gesturing slightly to the tense young man. “I’m afraid I don’t know the name of our traveling companion. We joined him rather unceremoniously. I’m sorry we have not introduced ourselves, you could say we have been through something of a shock.” She spoke vacantly, almost listlessly.

  There are those who decry the importance of good manners. This is understandable, to a point. However, often graces such as dignity and hope prove ephemeral, and at the end we are left with manners, if we ever had any, to provide some venue for civil communication with our environment. Jen was not screaming, ranting or raving, though one sensed that this might have been healthier for her. She seemed frozen, beyond deep traumatic stress, yet something in her upbringing and nature made her regret foregoing introductions for so long. Shamed somehow, Bridget introduced herself and the rest of the Celtics to Jen and Jorge.

  The third new arrival suddenly piped up. “I’m Dan.” He had blond buzz cut hair and an ingratiating manner. “When I saw everybody running, I followed. It looks like the three of us were the fastest.”

  “What happened?” Dante asked, as if he had been waiting for the right moment to ask.

  “Tough to say,” Dan answered. “It all came down pretty quick.”

  Jen nodded. “Our foster parents were driving. They pulled over to fix a flat. Dan pulled over to help and ask for directions and after about five minutes these shapes started appearing in the mist ahead of us, all lit up and glowing from our headlights. They weren’t moving fast until they got to within about fifty yards, and then they really started to run. They didn’t even look human. We’d been hearing all kinds of crazy stuff on the radio and on the TV, and we were checking the Internet too, though the reception has been spotty for all three, so we were at least a little bit on guard. They came up so fast though, it was all so unreal. When they jumped on Bob, our foster Dad, we all just stood there, like it was some kind of joke. If Dan hadn’t pulled out a gun and started shooting, we would have been dead. As it was, we wound up just sprinting. Barb, our foster Mom, must have fallen behind, or maybe she couldn’t leave Bob. It happened so fast. They were tearing Bob apart with their bare hands.”

  “I shouldn’t have run,” Jorge exploded. “They were so good to us. I could have died with them, something.”

  “What would that have accomplished?” Dan countered. “You had a flat. Bad things were going to happen from that point. It was nobody’s fault. This is awful, but you had the bad luck to break down and be unprepared right at the beginning of this thing.”

  “Hold up a second there Dan. What do you mean right at the beginning of this thing?” Dante broke in.

  “This is just getting started,” Dan retorted.

  “Why were you walking around with a gun?” Bridget asked him.

  “Thank God I was. I’m a Rent-A-Cop, coming home from work. I’m licensed to carry and I have been 24/7 since things started going crazy. I get better information because a couple of my buddies are real cops, so I’ve been real alert. I don’t even think the bunch we saw were from the main brigade of them. This was just kind of a peripheral action.”

  “What do you mean?” Bridget asked.

  “You should really watch the news,” Dan said curtly, and clammed up.

  Bridget seemed nonplussed, and began to say something but appeared to restrain herself. Instead, she leaned forward in her seat a little and called out, “Hey, Dante? Could you turn on the radio and see if there is any news on?” The others nodded and made sounds of assent. Dante flipped on the radio, using the Scan function, but it soon became clear no signal was forthcoming.

  “Try AM,” Dan suggested. After a few moments, an AM radio station came on, playing Country music.

  “This is all I’m getting.” Dante’s voice seemed strained.

  “Country music sucks,” observed Keisha.

  The minibus drove on. Road signs appeared stating that I-80 was twenty miles away.

  “We’re taking I-80 East. Where are you three going?” Gregor asked the three young people.

  “That’s the thing. We live in Tobyhanna, near the Army Depot. Those Psychos started popping up everywhere so Bob and Barb were going to run us out to their relatives towards Harrisburg. They said it was bound to be safer in the State Capitol,” Jen explained. “Then we kept getting diverted by roadblocks.”

  “Why did they think that?” Gregor demanded, seemingly puzzled.

  Jen blushed. “I’m not quite sure. It doesn’t matter now I guess, so it would be helpful for you to know that those two smoked quite a bit of pot. Sometimes their minds made jumps that I’m sure were completely plausible, but were often mysterious.”

  Keisha looked at her closely. “Were you born here? I mean, where are you from? Your accent sounded completely American until just now. I’m not trying to be rude, I’m just curious.”

  Jen spoke as if to herself. “I was an exchange student from Japan living here when my family died. They lived right outside of Fukushima. Since I had no living relatives, I was granted citizen status with extreme expedition and placed in foster care. I tried to learn to speak in the American style out of respect for my new homeland, and to avoid having to discuss the death of my family, which is painful to talk about.”

  The bus rolled on for a few minutes before Keisha spoke. “I am extremely sorry for your loss. If you have nowhere else to go, all three of you are invited to stay with me at my home in the Bronx until this gets sorted out.”

  Jorge seemed to be fighting with conflicting emotions. Finally, he broke his silence. “You are seriously all going to New York City? Why? Why now?”

  “It’s a little hard to explain, in fact, it is basically makes no sense to me, so it will be impossible to explain it to anyone else. We are all in rehab. Or sobriety counselor has sent us out on something that can best be described as a scavenger hunt. We have to go to this museum called The Cloisters in Manhattan. We each have some general goals we need to accomplish as a group, and also we have some private goals we need to achieve as well. By doing this, we
are to learn the value of Life.” Keisha chirped in a sing-song manner. Jen and Jorge looked disbelieving, and Dan said nothing. “Is that about right?” Keisha asked the group in general. Gregor and Bridget exhaled heavily. Dante chuckled in a manner resembling a snarl. “Oh, and we are supposed to be on reality TV while we do this.”

  Bridget suddenly exploded. “You know, I can fucking see quitting drinking. I mean, I’m not as bad as they say I am, and there are a whole lot who are worse. This is so bogus though. This seems like some kind of national crisis getting started. They can’t be serious about it, or they didn’t know how bad it is. Maybe it’s just a local thing.”

  “It’s not.” Jorge’s eyes were wide. “Bridget, that’s what we’ve been afraid to tell you. This is breaking out all over the East Coast. Pennsylvania is supposedly not that bad yet, but Jersey and New York are over the top with Psychos. You guys are heading right into this storm.”

  Dante called out sharply “Hey Dan, what are your cop friends saying?” Before Dan could answer, the radio squawked with the high pitched dissonance associated with AM radio. “We interrupt this program to bring you updates on the current crisis involving the phenomena referred to as Pill G Psychosis. It appears that the activity of the Psychos has escalated dramatically in the past 24 hours. Major cities such as Chicago, Boston, and New York have all instituted martial law until such time as the crisis has been resolved. If you live in or near an afflicted community, you should proceed immediately to the nearest civilian defense center. If for some reason you can’t leave your house, barricade yourself in as best you can. If you have Internet access, go to www.HomelandSecurity.com for online assistance. Above all, stay off the major interstates. Remember, Psychos must be avoided at all cost. If forced to confront one, they can be incapacitated by breaking their kneecaps, for instance, but can only be stopped permanently by destroying the Medulla Oblongata portion of their brain stem. This message will be repeated at half hour intervals.”

  After a brief pause, a slightly crazed hillbilly voice chimed in, “Oh yeah, that was a message from the good folks at the Department of Homeland Security. If you can’t go for help, stay indoors and stay locked and loaded. Remember, head shots get you extra points. Conserve what food and water you have. That crazeee comet charged up the Psychos batteries considerably, and I’m working on the theory that when their batteries die, they’ll scale it back down again. Thanks for nothing, Doc Gaultier. I’ll keep you posted on new developments, until then here’s a song from Randy Travis. This is Tex Western, signing off.” Some kind of religious ballad began. Dante turned it down. A sign appeared saying I-80 was about ten miles away.

  There was no sign of Psychos since the RV wreck. There seemed to be an unusual amount of battered and stranded vehicles, but there had been no sign of life for miles. This was a desolate part of Highway 33. The few moving vehicles they did see were hauling ass in the other direction at top speed.

  Gregor and Dante began to confer. “No matter what, we’ll have to go through the Delaware Water Gap,” Gregor said, sounding dogmatic. “There are no other entrances close to here, realistically.”

  “We would have to backtrack quite a bit. I’m not too familiar with this area. Seems like on the other side of I-80, the next bridge is at Dingmans Ferry, after that, it mainly looks like Port Jervis, following Route 6,” Dante was studying the GPS monitor. “That would take forever.”

  “Right after the first couple of exits, we could jump onto 46 East. That’s a smaller highway that parallels I-80 all the way to New York City. They said avoid the major interstates.”

  “The problem is going to be getting through traffic on I-80 East to jump off. It’s bound to be stacked up,” Dante opined. Gregor said nothing, but looked worried.

  “Not necessarily,” David interjected suddenly. “There is a chance that we will get the reverse commute effect.” Their blank looks forced him to continue. “I mean, if everybody is running away from New York, I-80 West is bound to be stacked up. We might just sail right through on I-80 East though, at least until we start hitting population centers. My guess is we get to Denville and get bogged down.” David felt self-conscious from everyone staring at me, but really, what did he expect? He had hardly said a word since the trip started. “I used to work out there. I have driven this route quite a bit,” he ended, kind of lamely.

  They looked at him. “Our best bet is to see what’s up at the Water Gap,” Dante answered. “What are your plans anyway?”

  Quietly, David replied. “I am not heavily vested in any plan. However, if I was vested in the plan laid out by Gerard and that exceedingly hot girl named Amiko, I would first stop in Pennsylvania at a gun shop for supplies.”

  “Do you have enough credits?” Gregor asked cautiously.

  “As a convicted felon, Pill Alpha credits would not help me in this or most other states. Also, it is eleven o’clock at night. Most stores would be closed anyway. Also, I would imagine there have been a substantial number of like-minded people who enjoyed the advantage of freedom we have lacked recently to make their purchases. In short, the gun stores might be sold out. If we were to attempt to break in and ransack such a store, we might be greeted by an armed and angry gun shop owner. One assumes that a person who owns a gun shop would not be morally averse to utilizing his own merchandise in a just cause, and shooting looters is an eminently just cause, methinks.” One should know that the reason David usually remained silent is that he was generally annoying to listen to, and had been made aware of this on many, many occasions.

  “You’re damn skippy,” Bridget snapped. “I’m not robbing anything just because some jail bird tells me to. I have morals, unlike some.”

  Feeling misunderstood, David reiterated. “I am actually arguing against stealing guns, if you listen to what I just said carefully. I am only saying that if we were going to try to get some weapons, this would be the state to do so in, I think. I have no insider information here. Alternatively, we could go to a firing range or something. I have heard there is one around here that has a lot of different guns you can rent and try.”

  Dan looked up. “That’s actually not such a bad idea. I go to The Liberty Range in East Stroudsburg. That’s how I know those cops I told you about. If we stopped there, they know me. They might loan me a couple of shotguns or something on credit. I know the owner pretty good. We would have to drive just a couple of miles out of the way, but it might not be a bad idea at all. Also, the owner lives right there, and he has a ham radio and is some kind of computer hacker, from what he says. He might know more about what’s up than anybody. In fact, I was thinking about going to see him anyway.”

  “Can you call him?” Dante wanted to know.

  “His number is programmed into my cell, which is in my car which is surrounded by Psychos. His number is unlisted, and his business line rings in his shop and goes right to voice mail, which he never checks when he’s not working at the range during the day. In other words, no, I can’t really call him. I only know the cops from hanging out there and drinking beers after we get done shooting. I never talk to them otherwise.”

  In the sudden silence, Keisha spoke up. “Before we commit by crossing the Delaware Water Gap, we should talk to somebody who knows what’s going on.” She seemed to express what the whole group was thinking. “Whatever happens from there will at least be based on some information. This whole thing is starting to get completely terrifying, and for me to say that is a sign of extremely crazy events happening.”

  “Okay, get off on Shiffer and go west, and then we head to Rimrock Canyon Road in the State Park area. His rifle range is right in there. It’s pretty easy to find, he should be there. He never goes anywhere at night.”

  Dante jumped off the highway onto a long and unlit stretch of road. There were few cars, and most of the houses were also dark. Having resolved on some action, the group lapsed into silence, just listening to the radio. Occasionally, Jen or Jorge had to stifle a sob.

  Chapter F
our-The Steelers

  As the last of The Celtics filed out of the room, Gwen stared at Amiko’s preternaturally cheerful face. She was having difficulty processing these new developments.

  Over the past few years, Society had been crumbling fast, she knew this. Everyone did. Shantytowns were springing up like mushrooms as even members of the upper classes were finding themselves locked out of the American Dream. True, many people weren’t missing a beat economically, and as hyperinflation and street crime winnowed through the populace, Gwen hadn’t suffered much. Her husband had an excellent job with the government, one of the few employers left who could afford to give cost of living adjustments. Her accountant husband had let it be known that “team players” such as himself were indispensable to the workings of the present system, and that she had nothing to fear. He was a good provider. They lived in a virtual fortress, in a super secure “gated community”, of the type only integral and productive members of society such as her husband, an IRS agent, deserved to have. He had been given one of the much coveted prescriptions for Pill Alpha, and he was trying to get her one as well, though of course, as he frequently told her, she could imagine the difficulties in getting off the waiting list.

  Gwen did not know why she drank, she just did. She had a rare genetic disorder of the kidneys that made it highly likely that she might eventually lapse into an alcoholic coma if she drank anything at all. Yet she would tipple whenever possible, drinking literally anything that contained alcohol, such as mouthwash or even perfume on particularly desperate occasions. Her husband’s attempts at restricting her access to alcohol only made her more ingenious at thinking up new sources of the drug. She would have liked to have said that the reason she drank was depression induced by observing the current economic and political situation, but she knew she drank because she loved the feeling. Whatever the underlying reason, her life had taken on an aspect of morbidity beyond the common experience of most. Every time she drank, she literally toyed with Death, and she couldn’t stop. Gwen was no different from millions of people in that she periodically sought release in a popular and legal chemical substance. In her case, though, her attempt at substituting a drink for a healthy relationship or meaning in her life could have lethal consequences. After three days in a hospital where she had literally almost checked out after drinking a pint of vodka, she had been convinced to give rehab a shot.