Season of the Dead Read online

  “Saw one what?”

  He jumped back and clapped his hands over his ears. “Oh-my-god-my-head.” He moaned and moved to the opposite wall, but kept his hands cupped over his ears. “I saw one of them. You know.” He nodded; whether it was for my benefit or his would forever remain a mystery. “Last night while some of us were out on patrol, we saw something in the woods out off Number 7.”

  I’m not stupid. I knew what he meant. He’d seen one of the infected. “Is it as bad as they say? I mean, what it does to them?”

  He giggled, then began to sob, sliding his hands around to cover his face. After a moment, he raised one arm and smeared snot from one cheek to the other. “Sorry. I picked up this cold yesterday and the meds are fucking me up some.” Then he turned and started for the door.

  The known symptoms of the virus flashed like a neon sign in my brain, and so far he was three for three. “Hey,” I said, as evenly as I could muster, “I thought—”

  Before I could blink, he was at the bars, snarling and reaching. “No,” he growled. “No-no-no more yelling! I’ll kill you, Gerry. I swear, I’ll fucking do you if you yell one more time!”

  I backed away, whispering as I did, “S’okay, buddy. I’m sorry. It won’t happen again.”

  “You’re right it won’t… or I’ll… I don’t know what’ll happen, but it won’t end well for you.”

  All things considered, my dinner was finished. As hungry as I was, there was no way I was going to eat another bite. I wanted to know more about what he saw the night before, but feared upsetting him any more than I already had. He had keys for my cell, and I’d eventually need to sleep.

  I breathed a silent sigh of relief when Jack walked over and sat in a chair near the door. Eventually, he fell into a fitful slumber. Sometime later—could’ve been an hour, maybe two—I, too, fell asleep.

  I awoke to a familiar sound. Five short blasts followed by one long one, repeated—the Ceveco emergency alarm at Imperial Oil. Beneath IOL’s alarm, I could make out at least two others: Nova and Suncor. That was bad… very bad. I stood on the stainless steel sink and jumped up to grab the bars covering the window overlooking the south parking lot. I pulled myself up and my face barely fit into the small space. Off in the distance the night sky glowed orange, lit up by every flare in the Valley, each no less than two-hundred feet. This was bad. If feed stock had been dumped to flare, something must have gone wrong. Given the fact that every plant was flaring meant only one thing.We’re fucked. If the hydrocarbons don’t leak out or explode and kill us all, when the boilers go critical, we all die.

  As I was about to let myself drop back down to the sink, movement out in the parking lot caught my eye. A man, likely out on patrol, stepped into the glow of a streetlight. His head was tilted as though he was listening for something, and his exaggerated gait suggested he was drunk. Fucking idiot. There’s a plague at our back door, every fucking siren that could possibly be screaming is going off, and this guy’s got time to drink.

  “Hey, asshole! Can’t you hear those alarms?”

  In answer (I’m guessing, but am pretty sure he heard me), the man jerked around, sniffed the air, and emitted a tortured, gurgling wail unlike anything I’ve ever heard. Screech after garbled screech, the man headed toward the building. As he reached the next closest lamppost, his features fell under the pooled light. Naked above the waist, pale flesh hung in slimy flaps from his chest, and chunks had been torn from his abdomen.

  Every nerve in my body screamed in chorus for me to run, to hide, to curl up and allow insanity to wash over me like a spring rain, but his one remaining eye, milky yet penetrating, held me.

  At the sound from somewhere in the room at my back—like a drain choking on the world’s biggest turd—I screamed and fell from the window, missed the sink, then landed flat on my back beside the bunk.

  Jack stood staring past me at the small barred window. “That’s the noise they make when they’re hungry.”

  As I lay there trying to understand what it was I’d seen, a rap at the outside door sent my heart into my throat. The knock was followed by a muffled voice: “Anderson, open up. It’s me.”

  Jack opened the door and a uniformed cop pushed past him and closed the door. His face was grim and blood covered most of his body. He pulled a pistol from his belt and pushed it into Jack’s hands. “For you. If shit goes south and they get past us, you know what to do.”

  Jack coughed and spit a clump of phlegm to the side. “Thanks,” he said.

  The cop had obviously not looked at Jack before this. Realization quickly dawned, and he skittered backward into the door. The cop’s eyes dropped to the key-ring on Jack’s belt, then our eyes met. That one look told me there was nothing he could do for me. He shot me an apologetic look, then slipped back out of the room. Seconds later, a succession of shots rang out from inside the building, followed by an inhuman scream, and another, and another. We were overrun.

  My eyes remained glued to the gun in Jack’s hand for quite some time. When I felt I had enough courage to look him in the eye, I did. “So… how ya feeling, Jack-o? You OK, buddy?”

  Jack, who’d been lost in his own thoughts, hefted the six-shooter, turned it and gave it a once over, then slipped it into his belt. His eyes, more grey than his usual brown now, glowed with some inexplicable inner light. He didn’t seem to be able to look me in the eye. “Truth be told, Gerry, I’ve been better.”

  CHAPTER 3

  Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA

  Lucia

  All of the large cities on the Eastern seaboard reported outbreaks…but the government said they were contained. The airports and trains had been shut down for weeks, so I didn’t think the virus could come as far west as Pittsburgh. The propaganda shit the government posted ran in continuous banners on all television channels and across the top of all websites:

  Contamination Alert: The Center for Disease Control has issued a RED ALERT for the following cities: New York, New York; Boston, Massachusetts; The District of Columbia…they trailed on. DO NOT PANIC.

  So, we didn’t.

  We became acclimated to the warnings and ignored them like commercials—well, for the most part. People were buying things like bullets, bottled water, and batteries. But, in the beginning, we stayed calm—because that’s what they told us to do. Pretending it wouldn’t happen to us kept it at arm’s length.

  I decided to go to the furry convention anyway. Logic told me I was safer in the farmlands than the city and that I shouldn’t gather in the same spot as people from across the nation. I was stupid.

  I spent a lot of money and time on my costume and alterations. I was a realistic brown squirrel—not one of those cartoon-looking fucks. My plumed tail curved in a sighing ‘S’ shape and I’d sewn stuffed pleather claws. I wasn’t a furry convention aficionado, but faked it because curiosity compelled me to experience something so bizarre. But, as with most costumed events, no one would smell my lie.

  I might have left the convention sooner, but with all of the animal imitations going on, it was hard to differentiate between normal furry activity and infection. I knew it had hit when a costumed brown dog chewed off a woman’s face until she stopped struggling. Two panda bears were enthralled in a bloody struggle. A zombie’s mouth tore the ass flap off of a person’s leopard costume and started feasting. The zombie at the leopard’s back door looked up for a moment and I saw his face was covered in blood and shit.

  I ran—not like a squirrel, but like a gimp in a squirrel costume with a stick joining my two knees.

  The costume saved me. Zombies clawed at me and bit me, but none of their teeth could break through the material. My escape lacked stealth and finesse. I darted with outstretched arms and my screams were dulled inside of my foam squirrel head. My car wasn’t an option—I couldn’t get the costume off quick enough before zombies would be on me, and I couldn’t fit inside of my car with the costume on.

  A FedEx truck was parked just beyond the front doors
to the convention center—its wide door was open to the driver’s seat like an invitation to a good idea. I grabbed a metal chair and swung it as I ran with gimpy hops. I struck some zombies, but mostly the chair rebounded off of me as I vigorously waved it back and forth.

  As I neared the truck, I tossed the chair behind me and jumped through the door. My paws slid off of the leather seat and I panicked to get inside without traction as the fur repelled my attempts. I felt a hand thrust up under my ass, and I was pushed further inside as I heard the door slam shut.

  “Jesus fuck! Tell me you aren’t a zombie under that squirrel costume.”

  “I’m not a zombie.”

  “I didn’t think you were with the way you almost hit me with that chair.”

  I felt the truck lurch forward, sat up and removed my squirrel head. My face was covered in sweat and my own spit from screaming. My long, dark hair had worked its way out of my ponytail and was stuck to my cheeks and forehead. I looked at the twenty-something man driving. “Are you bit?”

  “No. Are you?” He eyed me frantically.

  “No. They couldn’t bite through the costume.”

  A huge guffaw laugh erupted from his lungs as he looked at me. “You’re one lucky girl.”

  “Where are we going?”

  “I don’t know. Word must not be out that we have an outbreak here—the traffic’s too calm.”

  “Do you think the virus was brought into the city because of the convention?”

  “No, it’s been here for over a week.”

  “Over a week? But they haven’t announced it.”

  “They were keeping it quiet. I made a delivery to the hospital today and one of the nurses told me.”

  “Then why the fuck were you continuing with your delivery route?”

  “I wasn’t. I stopped at the convention center to pick up my girlfriend so we could leave.”

  “Your girlfriend is at the furry convention?”

  He rolled his eyes, “No, she worked at the front desk.”

  I prayed he wouldn’t say we were going back for her. “Did you find her?”

  “Yeah, she was the one trying to bite your left shoulder.”

  “Oh.”

  “We need to think. Where should we go?”

  “My parents have a farm about an hour east of here. It’s secluded—we could go there.”

  “No. Everything east of here is the red zone now. We’ll never get through the blockades they’ll be putting up.”

  I swallowed hard. My parents would surely be dead soon. “We just need to get out of the city as fast as possible.”

  “Do you know anyone here with a boat?”

  “Um… yeah, why?”

  “Because look at the traffic to the Fort Pitt Tunnel—it’s already closed.”

  The traffic was deadlocked and army trucks blocked the entrance. “Can you get down to Carson Street over the West End Bridge?”

  “Is that where the boat is?”

  “Yeah.” I was numb with terror. I wanted to call my parents, but my cell phone was in my car and I needed to stay focused.

  “Where am I going, exactly?”

  “Just head West down Carson Street. I’ll tell you when we get close.”

  “My name is Fred, by the way.”

  “Fred the FedEx guy?”

  “Yeah. Something wrong with that?”

  “Nope.” I sat back in my seat and gripped the upholstery.

  I didn’t tell him my name, and he didn’t ask. I scoped the streets out as Fred drove. Nothing was unusual. An old man sat on a bench, reading a paper; a mother exited a store with her child in tow.

  “Wait, shouldn’t we warn these people?”

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “Our only chance of getting out of the city is if we aren’t battling a stampede of people trying to jam up our exit.”

  Guilt panged in my chest. I knew he was right. “Up ahead, the brick house with the black iron fence. That’s it.”

  It was my friend Jason’s house. My best friend had been his father’s hospice nurse a few years back, and he often invited us to party on his boat. After his father passed away, we all remained friends.

  I knocked for a few minutes and even tried the knob before I heard someone shuffle to the door. Jason opened the door, his face was a swollen, and his eyes were red. For a second, I thought he might be infected, but he was just crying.

  “Lucia…” he choked.

  “Jason, what’s wrong?”

  He just shook his head, but did not speak. Fred and I pushed past him to get inside. “Where’s Vanessa?” Vanessa was his wife. They had just married the previous year. She was nine months pregnant with twins and her due date was close.

  “I had to take Vanessa to the hospital. She kept bleeding, but they sent her home and told her to rest. They said she’d be fine.” He was crying and slobbering.

  “Where is she?”

  “She’s in the bedroom. She’s dead.”

  “She’s dead?” I bound up the stairs, two at a time, and ran towards their bedroom. Thoughts raced through my head. She had a difficult pregnancy, but I never thought she would die from it.

  No zombie movie could have prepared me for what I saw when I opened the door. Vanessa lay on the bed, now thoroughly soaked with blood. The babies were infected. They had clawed their way out of Vanessa’s stomach and were chained to her by their umbilical cords, mindlessly squirming and biting, making gurgling sounds as they choked on the blood they tried to consume. Startled, I ran from the room and descended the stairs as quickly as I could.

  “Jason, the infection has reached the city. We have to leave.”

  “I’m not leaving my children or Vanessa.”

  “Jason, they’re dead. You have to come with us. We want to take your boat. It’s the only way. They’re starting to close the tunnels already.”

  “I can’t go. I’ve already been bitten.”

  Jason held up his hand. A crescent moon shaped bite was on the side of his hand. Lightning strikes of red veins shattered around the perimeter of the wound. I realized that was what a zombie bite looked like.

  “The change is quick, but mine was a shallow bite, so it’s taking longer. Listen, take the boat—take everything you need, and go. There are extra gallons of fuel in the boat house. Take them as well, but hurry. Save yourselves.”

  I looked at him, grateful for the help. “I wish I could hug you.”

  “Don’t—you shouldn’t touch me.” He smiled at me, “In the basement are my guns. The key to the gun cabinet is the small one on my key chain—there, on the counter. Now hurry.”

  We made four trips back inside the house—carrying all of the food, water, guns, and other items we could, as quickly as possible, down the dock to the boat. It was a luxury boat with couches that folded out into beds and Jason kept it well stocked.

  Once on board, we untied the boat and headed up the Ohio River.

  “I’m sorry about your friends.”

  “I think it’s something we need to get used to.”

  “Yeah,” he sighed. “I guess so.”

  “We won’t get very far if the locks aren’t running.”

  “Just so long as we can get out of the city, then we can make a run for a vehicle.”

  “Then what?”

  “Just start packing stuff up better—a bag for each of us that we can carry as we run.”

  “We’re going to leave all of this stuff behind? The boat would be our safest bet.”

  “I don’t want to, but we might have to. Eventually we’ll hit a place where we can’t travel any further up the river. We can’t just float, waiting for the apocalypse to end. Soon the infection will engulf this entire area and we’ll be a floating snack, slowly starving to death.”

  “An apocalypse—that’s what this is, isn’t it?”

  “Yes.”

  CHAPTER 4

  Dublin, Ireland

  Paul

  I woke with
a start as a loud knock first trespassed into my dream, and then tore it asunder. With a pounding heart and disoriented mind, I swung my legs from the warm embrace of my bed to stand unsteadily on unsure feet.

  “What do you want?” I asked. I was on edge, seriously on edge, on the verge of going over if truth be told. We all were. It had been a tough couple of weeks… Tough? Ha! It was a living fucking nightmare.

  Whoever it was knocked again without answering. Bastards were going to make me get up.

  “For fuck sake!” I grumbled and marched to the front door of my apartment in my boxers. Mrs. Watson from down the corridor was standing in the hall. I could see she had been crying, and her hands were trembling. I bit back the nasty comment I was about to unleash on the person who disturbed my sleep.

  “I need to go out,” she said. Her voice quivered.

  “That is not a good idea,” I answered her.Understatement of the century, I silently added.

  “I have no choice. Brian’s medication is almost gone. I had hoped we would have been rescued by now. I thought it would be all over.” She started to cry.

  Brian was her nine year old son. He had some sort of breathing problem. To be honest, I wasn’t really sure what it was, I hadn’t paid that much attention to them before, well… before we all ended up in hell together.

  “Come in,” I said, and opened the door wider for her to enter. “Grab a seat while I get dressed.” I quickly threw on a pair of jeans and tee-shirt before rejoining her in the living room.

  “What do the others think?” I asked. The others were the surviving residents of my City Centre apartment block. About forty of us had barricaded ourselves into the building when hell was unleashed. I had hoped we would have been rescued before now too—I did not say that to Mrs. Watson though.

  “I haven’t said anything yet.”

  “Okay,” I said. “We’ll need to talk to everyone else. Fuck! None of us have been outside in what… three weeks?”

  Why was she bringing this shit to me? I’d hardly ever spoken to the woman.

  “I know,” she said, her head bowed.