Dia of the Dead (20 page)

She opened one of the desk drawers and pulled out a slender black remote. She pressed a button and the news coverage of the carnage at the hospital was replaced by the footage from the Bixby Studios security cameras. The screen was split into quarters, each featuring footage from all over the lot, cycling though each camera’s feed. I saw many familiar faces on screen as they moved toward an unknown destination under the night sk
y
.

I turned away, unable to look any longer. I locked eyes with Brendan and blushed again. We were sitting close enough to justify Reagan’s comments. I scooted away from him; Brendan stood up and cleared his throat. He approached Mr. Bixby’s desk, his eyes set on Reagan.

“Reagan, I’m sorry for not being honest with you. I put my career first and didn’t consider your feelings. I apologize for being such an inconsiderate jer
k,
” he said.

Reagan’s face softened briefly then quickly hardened back into a frown. “Whatever,” she said, waving him off.

He stood there for a moment, looking embarrassed and unsure of what to say next. He cleared his throat again and shifted in his stance.

“I’m going to go check on Kaci. She’s been awfully quiet since we’ve been here and a quiet Kaci Miller is weir
d,
” I said, thankful for the excuse to get away from the awkwardness of watching Brendan apologize to Reagan.

I got up from the floor. My bones creaked and my muscles groaned in protest as I walked over to the window and sat down next to her. She looked out of the window. Her hair spread our over her shoulders like a blanket, obscuring her face.

“Kaci,” I said softly, lightly nudging her shoulder to get her attention.  She turned toward me. I jumped, moving away from her. The little color her fair skin had had left, leaving it a sickly gray. Dark circles surrounded her green eyes and there was a drying stain of black trailing down her chin from the corner of her mouth.

“Kaci, were you bitten?” I kept my voice low, not wanting to alarm Brendan and Reagan. I glanced over my shoulder. Brendan was on his feet, looking at us, and Reagan had the desk chair swiveled in our direction, her eyes watching us intensely. They knew something was up.

Kaci shook her hea
d
.

“Are you sure?”

Kaci didn’t reply. Instead she stared out of the window.

“What’s going on?” Brendan asked from behind us.

“Nothing,” I said over my shoulder.

I turned back to Kaci and brushed her hair away to check for bites. Her legs seemed fine.  I checked her arms; they were left exposed thanks to her ripped tank top. There were no bites but the long scratch Mason left on the length of her arm looked like it was setting up a pretty nasty infection. The scratches from Will were still seeping through the cloth she’d tied around her upper arm. I saw a tinge of the blue rash that appeared on both Amber and Taylor beginning to spread from the wound. She touched the cloth and winced. I circled her to see what could be wrong. Besides the scratch on her arm, she had a semi-circle of what looked to be teeth marks on her shoulder blade.

“Why didn’t you say anything about this, Kace?” I asked looking at the bite, probably from Will.

She shrugged. “I thought I was special,” she said hoarsely.

“Special?”

She looked at me fully. The color of her eyes appeared to darken, changing to an emerald color. Patches of blue snaked their way up her neck. 

“There’s always someone in these kinds of situations who has an immunity. I thought it’d be me but it’s probably Brendan. Amber bit him earlier and he’s fine.”

I looked back at him. His skin still had a healthy glow and despite his busted lip, ripped shirt, and gore splattered jeans, he was in tip-top shape. I looked at Kaci—who coughed up tiny bubbles of black ooze, wiping it away with the back of her hand—then back to Brendan. They were as different as night and day. I got up from the floor and went over to him, staring at him puzzled.

“What?” He shifted in his stance.

“How are you okay if Amber bit you like Kaci said?” I asked.

“Yeah, how?” Reagan joined me standing in front of him, looking as confused as I was.

“I dunno. I feel fine though.” He held his arms out in front of him, examining them. “Maybe it’s because I’m Canadian.”

“What?” Reagan and I said in unison.

“How does being Canadian make you immune? It makes absolutely no sense,” Reagan said loudly.

“I dunno.” Brendan shrugged. “Must be the 100% Canuck moose venom pumping through my veins.”

He flexed his bicep and gave it a quick peck before lowering his arm.

“What?” Reagan and I repeated again in unison, both of our faces screwed up tightly.

Reagan’s eyes were wide in disbelief, her mouth hanging open slightly. “That may be the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard, and I’ve heard some pretty dumb stuff in the last couple of hours.”

“Yeah, well…” Brendan muttered, shifting in his stance. “I’m just going off of what I learned from movies and comics. There could be a million reasons why I’m not a zombie. All we really know is that we’re pretty sure Z might possibly be behind all this but we have no idea where it came from or why it turned everyone into zombies. Being Canadian could make me immune. I’m an actor not a scientist, dammit so who knows why I’m okay.” He huffed. We had obviously bruised his ego.

I wanted to ask more questions about his Canadian-ness and its magical power of immunity but we had more pressing matters at hand.

“What’re we going to do about Kaci?” I asked.

“What’re we going to do about him?” Reagan pointed at Brendan.  “We all know that she’s probably not going to last much longer but him? He’s like a ticking time bomb. He could start acting weird at any moment.”

“I told you I feel fine. I look fine, don’t I?” He looked around for a surface to check his appearance.

“You do,” I assured him.

He sighed then pumped his fist. “Awesome.”

“I think Kaci’s more at risk right now, Reagan.” I lowered my voice.  “We need to figure out what to do with her.”

Both of them gave me knowing look
s
.

“No,” I gasped, taking a step back. “We can’t.”

“We have to,” Brendan said somberly.

“We can think of another way. We can’t do that to her. Not Kaci. She’s our friend.”

“She’s your friend,” Reagan said, looking at her fingernails instead of at me. “If Kaci’s a threat, she has to be eliminated. Plain and simple.” 

I looked to Brendan, hoping he had another solution. 

“I agree with Reagan,” he said with a blank expression.

I had been outvoted.  I knew this was coming yet part of me hoped for a different outcome.

“Do what you have to do.” Kaci coughed, not turning around to face us.

Brendan, Reagan, and I exchanged looks. The same question seemed to be on all of our minds: who was going to be the person to do the deed?

The task of what to do with Kaci was left to the person with the shortest straw. Reagan found a few of them in the cabinet where Mr. Bixby had quite a collection of aged Scotch. She shortened one and held it along with two others inside her fist. Brendan and I picked one then we all compared our selections. Brendan put his hand on my shoulder and gave it a light squeeze as he looked at me with sad eyes.

“Sorry, Dia.” He let go and handed me the golf club. I took it from him, accepting the task.

Kaci’s life had to end before zombism ended it for her (and gave her a frightening second wind). Of course it fell to me. Reagan didn’t consider her a friend, and Brendan and Kaci never hung out. That left me, her best friend. If television, movies, and my little over a year of acting experience told me anything, it was that the person with the closest relationship to the person with failing health was responsible for the mercy killing. It ups the drama and gets good ratings. If this were televise
d,
we’d probably be making solid sweeps numbers.

I approached Kaci slowly, tears trickling down my face. Her back was toward the group. The distance between
Kaci and us seemed like light years though it was only a few feet. Every memory I had of her flooded my mind, causing me to stop. I turned back to Reagan and Brendan.

“I can’t do this.”

“You have to. Your straw was the shortest. Stop wasting time we can’t afford to waste and go ahead and do it.” Reagan waved me forward. Brendan urged me on as well. They weren’t going to let me off the hook. I took a step forward and paused again.

“I can’t.” I turned back to them. “Look at me. I’m struggling to hold the damn golf club. I won’t do this.” I dropped the club and wiped more tears away.

“Fine. I’ll do it.” Brendan huffed and marched forward, sweeping up the club from the floor on his way over to Kaci. He stopped just behind her and raised the club over his head, ready to bring it down and deliver a blow. 

“Dammit
.
I
can’t do this either.” He dropped the club and came back over to Reagan and me.

“We need a different plan. She’s Kaci. Her crush on Mason was annoying but she was a nice girl,” he said defeated.

Kaci coughed and wheezed in the quiet room as we put our heads together and tried to come up with another solution.

“I have an idea,” I said.
Reaganand Brendan’s heads perked up from their bowed position to look at m
e
.

I told them my plan and both agreed it was better than having Kaci’s blood on our hands. Brendan scooped Kaci up from the floor, carrying her in his arms. She was fading fast; her eyes barely managed to stay open. She could change at any moment. Reagan opened the secret exit. 

My plan was simple: drop Kaci off outside before the change could happen and let nature take its course…far away from us. I went with Brendan, carrying the club just in case something went wrong. Kaci bounced around in Brendan’s arms as we dashed down the stairs as quickly as we could. I ran a little ahead of him so I could open the door when we reached the bottom. I stopped at the door.

“W-W-What’s the hold up?” Brendan breathed when he caught up.

I put up my finger, signaling him to wait a second while I panted to catch my breath. I lowered it once my breathing was nearly normal.

“She’s getting heavier,” Brendan said.

“It won’t take long. I want to say something to her before we…you know.”

“Okay,” Brendan said softly. He held her away from him and closer to me.

I looked at her frail frame in his arms. She looked nothing like the Kaci I knew. It seemed like even the color of her hair had faded in the last couple of minutes. But there was still a bit of light in her. I felt it. It would slip away soon and be replaced by something else. I had to say what I wanted o say while Kaci was still Kaci.

“Kace, I don’t know if you can hear me or not but thank you.” My voice cracked. Tears were on the horizon, but I cleared my throat and continued. “Thank you for being the one-person welcoming party to Bixby. Thank you for showing me the ins-and-outs and giving me insight on how to survive in this business and at this company. Thank you for taking the time to explain things to me and re-explaining when I didn’t get them on the first go. Thank you for being patient. Thank you for always being kind. Thank you for being so awesome and letting me borrow your clothes. Thank you for being my friend, Kaci Miller. You were my best friend, and I’ll never forget you.” I couldn’t stop the tears if I wanted to. I cried as I gave her a parting pat on her head. Her skin was cool to the touch.

“Ready?” Brendan said after a moment of silence.

I nodded. He prepared Kaci in his arms and I positioned myself to open the door.

“On the count of three,” he said in a low tone. “One. Two. Three!”  Kaci gagged, puking black all over Brendan’s shoes.

“Ugh. Gross!” he yelled. “Open the damn door already.”

I pushed open the door. Several zombies shuffled past the entrance. I spotted Blake’s bright blue hair in the crowd. None of them noticed us. Brendan took a few steps outside. He heaved Kaci’s body up into the air and tossed her before he ran back inside. Kaci landed at the feet of the studio’s writers, a pudgy bald guy wearing a pair of broken glasses and a stained blue shirt. He bent low and nibbled on a bit of her face.  She didn’t cry or scream. Instead, she lay there still and silent as he took another bite. She began to convulse which stopped him from getting that third bite. She went stiff then suddenly, she was up, completely transformed. Her black eyes fixed on me at the door. She growled viciously and sprinted forward, moving faster than the others, toward Brendan and m
e
.

“Close it!” Brendan yelled.

I froze as Kaci hurdled toward us.

“Dia, close the door!” He screamed again, pushing me out of the way and closed the door himself. 

Kaci slammed into it, leaving a large dent. Her fingernails scratching against the metal as she tried clawing her way back inside.

“Come on.” Brendan grabbed my arm and pulled me toward the stairs. We ran up them, not looking back until we met Reagan at the top. We ran past her and yelled for her to close the door. We ignored her questions as she joined us back inside the room and went to the TV to look at the security footage. We sighed with relief when it showed the door was closed even though Kaci still tried to get in.