Fractured: Outbreak ZOM-813 (11 page)

I pulled Dan back with us, and he didn’t fight me. We let Mayhem guide us to the back wall but kept looking back to the other side of the room where the noise was coming from.

“Infected!” A scream rose into the air above all the other noise.

Figures began coming through the tunnel entrances like flood water, and bodies scattered, fleeing for their lives. There was mass panic, and shrieks so loud they were blinding.

Everything happened so fast. Dan and I ran, gripping each other’s hands, to the nearest exit. There were people running in circles, and some frozen still.  Those who managed to get to the doorways crowded one another and trampled those who fell. It was like they didn’t even see each other. Pushing, clawing, and stepping on one another.

Mayhem took us down a tunnel on the other edge of the room.  As we ran, we could hear what sounded like a stampede of people behind us coming fast. We could see the dim light at the end, but to our horror, a soldier was closing the gate.

“Open the fucking door!” Dan screamed out.

The clank from the gate being closed echoed against the walls. But we kept running. When we made it to the end, there was no one at the door. The soldier had left us there. The others behind us were at our backs, pleading, crying for someone to open the door.

“Oh, my God, what do we do?” I looked to Dan who was watching our backs.

“We can’t go back,” Dan said.

More footsteps.

Another soldier ran into view and stopped.

“Please open the door! Please! We’re not infected!” I screamed.

This guy was young and looked terrified out of his mind. He didn’t hesitate, immediately unlatching the door, and a mass of crying survivors fell to the ground around him.

“Thank you,” we all said in unison as we pushed past the door.

“The breach was in South Glen. Head down to the West Glen tunnels. Everything’s being cleared and locked down,” the soldier called out to us.

I heard the tunnel gate slam shut behind me and prayed that there was nobody left on the wrong side of the steel gate. I depended on the young soldier to do his job, and shut the gate at the right moment.

We were in a group of ten or so people, although it sounded like the entire base was coming with us. Dan and I ran cautiously, avoiding the pitfalls of sprinting in the wrong direction. The rest of the group quickly ran past and disappeared into the darkness. Dan and I kept a steady pace, remaining alert and mindful of every step. We didn’t want to get caught up in the panic. The gun fire and screams seemed to be following us.

Trying to conserve energy in the early morning, none of the tunnels were well lit.  During quiet hours, the entire facility went to a sort of sleep mode, bringing all lights down and requiring the manual opening and closing of doors. Now we were blind rats running through a maze of tunnels with infected flooding in.

“We have to get to the truck.”

“Do you remember what area we came through? Because I don’t!” I looked back to see if I could read any signs. I couldn’t see anything in this place.

“Operations is either the North or West Glen areas.”

“That soldier said to head to the West Glen area.”

Voices grabbed my attention.

When I turned around, another large group was running towards our direction. I figured it was a good sign they weren’t crying out in fear. As they got closer to us, we could make out that soldiers were leading the group.

“Which way is Operations?” Dan asked as we matched their pace.

The soldier stopped for a moment. “Operations isn’t accessible from here. We need to get to the West area. Follow me.”

Dan took my hand, and we did as we were told. Neither of us really wanted to get lost in this place. It was, after all, confusing enough during the day. We attached ourselves to the group and followed them through the dark corridors.

My heart was pumping so hard that I could feel it in my ears. My eyes were finally adjusting or the lights weren’t as dim in this area of the facility. The noises of the battle behind us seemed to fade. We hadn’t seen any other survivors besides the group we were attached to. Either we were the only ones left, or there were other access tunnels to this West Glen area.

Mayhem’s panting was getting heavier as he tired.

“Good boy, buddy,” I called out to the dog to keep him motivated. I truly believed that he had saved us from what was certainly a massacre in the sleeping area. 

He responded by wagging his tail and glancing up at me.

The tunnels twisted and turned in the darkness. We would have been lost had we not had the soldiers to guide us. We ran into another small group of survivors, some of whom were carrying children. The soldiers already had their weapons drawn.

I hadn’t even noticed when he pulled it, but Dan also had his weapon out. I didn’t check if mine was still on me as I was too concerned keeping hold of Mayhem and Dan. I let go of Dan’s hand momentarily to check the side of my bag.  I rooted around in the bag furiously until my hand gripped the cold steel of the muzzle of my pistol. Relieved it was still there, I quickly grabbed hold of Dan again.

Tensions were high among everyone. There wasn’t a lot of shouting from the soldiers, more calm directives as they didn’t want to draw attention to us. The soldiers briefly checked the group to make sure they weren’t infected, and we continued to move. As we moved forward, the group attached themselves to the rear.

We finally jogged under the sign for West Glen. The tunnel widened and broke off in different directions. Other soldiers leading small groups came around corners. As they entered the safe room, they slammed and locked the gates behind them.

One of the soldiers climbed an industrial steel stair unit, skipping every other step. At the top was a door, the same aircraft carrier style door that we saw throughout the base with a hatch wheel used to open it.  It seemed inefficient for the amount of people filtering through, but it was presumably not designed with an emergency evacuation in mind. He shouted, “All clear?” to the other soldiers below, and almost in unison they replied with a loud “hooah!” With the room sealed, he turned the wheel on the door while calling out, “Let’s move people!”

The soldiers at the bottom of the stairs directed everyone up. It turned into a funnel of people coming together, trying to stay organized under terrifying conditions while squeezing onto the stairs one by one and disappearing through the steel door. It was a painfully slow process considering what lurked behind us in the tunnels.

Mayhem seemed to pick up on my thoughts and reflected my own agitation with a slight whimper. He was pacing in the confined space we had surrounded by a mass of people.  Then he froze, his whimper turned to a low growl.

“Oh shit.” Dan was turned around, looking past the other survivors.

I turned to see what had captured his attention. The tunnel was dark, and I strained to see anything at all.  Since the dim lights were on the ceiling, everything disappeared from the waist down. As my eyes focused, I saw a dark silhouette at the end apparently just staring in our direction. Then another came into view.

“Oh my God! Infected!” A cry broke the air.

Everyone turned around to see what was behind them. The infected stumbled towards us, their gurgled hisses grew louder. I watched as what once was a soldier threw himself against the locked gate with a heavy rattle of the steel on steel. Suddenly there was another loud ‘bang,’ and I watched as an infected reached madly through the bars, grasping at the warm bodies in front of it.

Just as I sighed in relief to see the gates were holding, there was a new sound—metal on concrete.  I looked to my left and saw a flood of infected falling through a door. Damn the low power and damn manual locks.

Panic struck, and we were immediately getting pushed forward. The frenzied current of people made it nearly impossible for the soldiers to advance toward the threat. They were like salmon trying to swim up river while fighting raging rapids. Most of the ranks were unable to get to the back in order to defend the living from the infected.

More infected came around the corner until the tunnel was black with bobbing heads moving our way.

Gunfire rang out, and some people ducked to the floor. They were immediately trampled over by others.

Dan pushed me in front of him, turned, and fired his gun at the infected.

It was letting go of Dan or Mayhem and I made the only choice I could, to let go of Dan and grab my gun. We were separated.

Mayhem and I were bulldozed by everyone behind us. Dan shoved back.

“Dan!” I couldn’t fight the crowd driving me forward. “Dan!” I screamed for him with everything in my lungs, but I couldn’t even hear my own voice over the madness.

The infected were flooding the tunnel.

There was no escaping the pull of the flood of people so I looked up toward the exit and allowed myself to be carried by the tide of panicked bodies.  I tripped over the first of the stairs and hit them hard.  If I had my wits about me, I would have realized that I was in more immediate danger of being trampled than being taken by the infected mob. Mayhem barked in my face sharply, like he was ordering me to get up. Unable to ignore his order, I pushed hard against the staircase and snapped back to my feet. I repeatedly glanced back to look for Dan, but in vain. From the top of the stairs I couldn’t see anything but shadows, nor could I hear anything over the gunfire and screams. There was no point resisting the moving wall of humanity pushing me through the door, no way I could get back to Dan or even see if he was alive.

I was pushed through the door, and quickly pressed myself against the wall with Mayhem. No one looked back as they ran by.

We were in a shallow cave with a wide opening camouflaged with green nets and vines. I couldn’t see much past the camouflage other than to note that it was still dark.

Mayhem barked over and over again at the door.  People were still screaming, guns still firing. I couldn’t tell how long this went on. 

Wasn’t Dan right behind me?
 

I told myself over and over again that the next person through the door would be him.

There was a pause in the flow of people out the door during which time my heart stopped beating, and I quit breathing.  

I will never know if my lungs had reached their breaking point or if the sight of Dan brought my breathing back online as air exploded into my chest, Dan’s body burst out the exit, falling backwards gun drawn. As he stumbled, I saw that he was not alone.  There was an infected diving at him, grabbing hold of his legs. The thing clawed at him. Dan flailed around, kicking his free leg repeatedly into the face of the infected man.

Another soldier fell through the door with an infected man clinging to his back, biting into his shoulder.

I aimed my weapon and fired. I felt the pressure from the blast through my entire body and into my bones. The infected man Dan was fighting flew back and rolled to the ground. I stepped closer, aimed, and fired the next bullet straight into its skull.

I aimed again, and fired at the infected who was attacking the soldier. It was a hit, but not a kill shot. It was, however, good enough to give the soldier enough time to take a knife and drive it through the infected’s head.

“Are you hurt?” I rushed to Dan with my hand out.

“No, that fucker luckily couldn’t bite through my boot,” Dan said, taking my hand and getting to his feet.

We looked at the wounded soldier. Neither of us knew what to say to him. No simple thank you could relay the gratitude we felt towards the soldiers who had proven themselves willing to make the ultimate sacrifice to keep us safe.

“You guys need to keep moving!” He was bleeding badly, and he knew that he was doomed. The soldier went to the door, blasted a few rounds, and closed it. His last act was to seal the threat away from the survivors. Resigned to his fate, he nodded his head in the direction of the exit, urging us to leave him there, never to be seen again.

We didn’t waste another second nor take his sacrifice for granted. The only way to honor his bravery was to survive. I gave Mayhem a tug and we ran through the cave opening. Behind us we heard a single gunshot followed by the morning’s silence.

CHAPTER 9

It was getting to the hours of the morning when the sky was more grey than black, coated with a heavy fog. I tried to listen for anything besides the sound of my heart pounding and my heavy breathing as I sucked in all the oxygen I could. We sprinted through the trees and could see a clearing ahead of us.

People had scattered everywhere. The gunfire had become more infrequent.

We made it out of the woods and into a clearing covered with overgrown grass. It was a little brighter here, being out from under the trees.

“Where’s the military? Where are the vehicles?” I asked out of breath. I didn’t even hear truck engines; if they had been there, they were long gone.

“I don’t know. But don’t stop.” Dan scanned all around us as we continued to run.

We made it to the road where we finally slowed and were able to truly assess the situation. Mayhem’s ears remained erect as he sniffed the air.

“Where the hell are we?” I knew Dan couldn’t answer that.

“I have no idea. But I do know our truck has to be somewhere south of here. We need to find the 59 and head south.” Dan was out of breath.

“What about Jesse and Carl… Jaxon, Ethan. Do you think they got out?”

“We don’t have time to think about that right now,” Dan said thickly.

I knew he was right.

Shadows were still running from the woods in all directions. My eyes followed a large group as they fled through the clearing and up the road away from us. The road turned, and the group disappeared around the corner.

“Maybe that way is to the town?” I pointed to their direction.

“Yeah. Come on, let’s go.” Dan started in a slow jog with Mayhem and me right behind him.

We stayed in the middle of the road, maintaining lots of clearing around us, making it easy to see our surroundings. We made it to where the street turned, and then around the corner the small town of Glen came into view.

The road went for another half mile at most with only one stop sign intersection. The place looked like something out of the old west with wood paneled buildings and large storefronts with covered porches. There were infected here wandering the streets, groaning. In the distance, they sounded almost like a swarm of bees.

Mayhem expressed his aggression with a snarl, but Dan and I sprinted for the closest building before he could bark or any of the infected could see us. They were all focused on one particular building.  I figured groups from the underground camp, or any other survivors, were taking cover inside.  Either way, it was keeping the infected from noticing us.

“I think at the end of this road is the 59,” Dan said.

“Do you hear that?” I asked.

Dan focused on listening but didn’t answer.

“This way.” I jogged towards the back of the building, pulling my machete from its strap. Dan followed behind me. We stopped at the back and peeked around the corner. When I saw it was clear, I pointed to what I found. About 25 yards away was a shallow stream that wound its way through small groves of trees.  We could use the streambed rather than the road and be protected by the shadows of the trees.

Dan nodded, and we headed for the creek. Once we reached it, we moved parallel to the town. Ahead of us stood an old stone bridge with two arches which allowed the water to move through. The bridge was large enough for traffic to pass over it. From our vantage we couldn’t see any infected on the bridge.

We climbed the steep but short embankment to reach the road. We moved up slowly, and searched our surroundings, making sure it was all clear.

A sign posted on the bridge read 59 HIGHWAY.

“The truck can’t be that much farther,” Dan said.

We turned to head south onto the roadway, away from the town, and were greeted by three figures about 100 yards away standing in the middle of the highway.

“Shit.”

Mayhem barked at the infected.

“Leave it Mayhem.” I tugged at his leash. There was no use thinking we were going to hide. They had their eyes locked on us.

“No guns.” Dan looked behind us towards the town and back to the three just ahead. “We’ll bring every infected in town this way if we shoot these things.” He pulled out his machete.

The infected moved at different paces, and as the closest one approached, I could make out that it was a young man.  The second was not too far behind him and also looked like a male but was a little harder to make out. Both appeared as if they had been infected since the beginning of the outbreak; even at this distance I could see that their skin was barely clinging to their bones, and that goopy clumps of blood was dripping from their wounds. The third was getting farther behind, barely moving as it was being slowed down from dragging a limp leg.

The infected lurched and twitched as they moved. It was hard not to get distracted and just watch them. They were gaunt in the face, with swelling around their eyes. Anything alive, or at least sentient, had left their body, leaving only dead cells holding them together.

I wasn’t sure how I was going to hold Mayhem and cut this thing’s head off. Dan took a few steps ahead of me and confronted the first man holding his machete up, ready to take a swing. The infected man lunged at him, and Dan sliced open its neck sending it crashing to the ground. The second wasn’t far behind. I held my machete out like a spear keeping a firm grip while holding Mayhem with my other hand.

The saving grace for a stand-off with the infected was that they couldn’t think beyond biting and eating. The second infected man impaled itself onto my machete almost like he didn’t even see it. He was heavier than he looked. I braced myself but couldn’t hold his weight.  I could feel him continuing to push forward and knew that he would topple us.  Before we could both collapse, Dan kicked it in the mid-section, sending it reeling to the ground at our feet.  I plunged my weapon through its skull without hesitation, completely caught in the moment.  Then time seemed to slow as I pulled my machete from its head and cursed at the sloshing sound their bodies made. The sound made my skin crawl.

Mayhem barked at the third infected.

“Leave it, Mayhem!” I jerked his leash.

Mayhem was frustrated

“He’s gonna bring the entire neighborhood to us.” Dan approached the infected.

As it got closer, we could make out it was a woman. He didn’t think twice; he lifted his machete and swung downward until the blade bit into her skull.

Dan turned back to me but looked over my shoulder. “We gotta go.”

I looked behind us to find infected coming around the street corner from the town.

We ran south down Highway 59 with the infected following behind. We knew the farm house where we had parked the truck couldn’t be that far.

It was only about a half mile to where the open field with oil pumps and abandoned farm house came into our view. It was such a relief, and it gave us the push we needed to move faster.

There was always something eerie about the central coast. Most of the morning it was covered in fog, then a few hours of beautiful sunshine, and by 3pm the fog would roll in again. My sister and I loved to say we found ourselves in Stephen King's “The Mist” and would endlessly reference all the end-of-the-world horror movies we watched throughout our lives. It was our silly way of whistling in the dark and letting our imaginations run wild without letting it get the best of us. We would make up scenarios about the world ending with everyone turned in to flesh eating monsters, and with that came a forever-gloom over the world. Then it was silly. Now, it was all too real. 

Something was wrong here. I couldn’t quite put my finger on it, but everything felt off. Mayhem wasn’t growling or expressing agitation, just more of an uneasy cower. His ears were down, tail not wagging. Dan must have been feeling the same way, as he began to move a little closer to me and we slowed down.

I hadn’t noticed when we first arrived just how creepy this property was. It made the hair on the back of my neck stand straight up. The field was dry, and the house looked like it would eventually fall in on itself. Years of abandonment had taken its toll on the property.

We approached the house with caution, anticipating there could be infected around the corner. Dan stopped us. We paused.

“Do you see that?” Dan asked directing my attention ahead of us.

Through the fog, a dark lump lay in the driveway beyond the house and close to the garage. It looked like a body, but it was hard to tell.

I nodded.

We continued forward. I watched Mayhem for any sign or warning. He sniffed the air, still tense in his walk.

We were finally close enough where we could tell that it was, in fact, a body. It wasn’t moving. Mayhem grumbled.

All of a sudden, running footsteps came up from behind. I didn’t have time to turn around. A sharp pain slammed the back of my skull and my vision went black.

* * *

I woke up with a horrible headache, finding myself lying on the ground. My body wouldn’t function. My vision was blurry, and I couldn’t quite focus enough to get a view of where I was.

Am I paralyzed?
I thought to myself.

I couldn’t really feel anything except the relentless pounding in the back of my head.

Where’s Dan? Mayhem?

I then felt my hands were tied behind my back. My vision started to clear up. I was in a room that looked like an attic with large windows. The floor was wood with gaping holes and missing boards.  The paint was coming off the walls, and most of the drywall was gone leaving the studs exposed.  I wasn’t in an attic; I was in the main floor of a house.

I’m in the abandoned house.

We saw a body in the road.

Where’s Dan? Mayhem?

The body in the road was a trap!

Footsteps. With each step the wood floor creaked. They were slow and steady.

Should I pretend to still be out?

It was too late for that. The steps stopped behind me, and a stranger leaned over me.

“Welcome back!” It was a man’s voice, sounding sarcastically joyous.

He took his boot, and stepped down on my shoulder, forcing my body to roll on my back. He was an older man, about mid-fifties, and wasn’t aging well from the deep lines in his face. He leaned down to take my arm and pulled me to my feet.

I was still so groggy I could barely stand.

“What’s happening?” were the only words I could get out.

“What’s happening is you and your boyfriend have something I want,” the voice said.

“Where’s Dan?”

“Oh, don’t you worry about him. He’s just fine in the other room. And your dog, well we might have some fun teaching it a lesson about biting.”

With those words, the man pushed me over to the edge of one of the larger holes in the floor. With my head held over the ragged hardwood, I could see into the basement an infected woman stood below us, looking up, hissing. She looked newly turned, still holding very human features. She cocked her head like she was actually thinking and planning about her attack.

“What do you want?” I kept my eyes on the infected below us.

“I want to know how to get in that underground military base. I’m assuming that’s where you kids came from.”

“What are you talking about? They let all survivors in!” I was fully awake and aware I was in the hands of a crazy man.

“No darlin’, I don’t need the fucking military running my ass. This is a whole new world. Haven’t you noticed? I want their guns, supplies. So you’re gonna tell me everything I need to know about this underground base.” He squeezed the back of my neck as he spoke with his lips so close to my ear I could feel his heated breath.

“Where’s Dan?”

“He’s about to be in that hole with her if you don’t start talking.”

“You’ll be disappointed to find out that the base was overrun with infected,” I managed to say spitefully.  

There was an uncomfortable pause. I couldn’t hear anything around us, and my fear was beginning to get the best of me.
Could Dan and Mayhem already be dead?

“That is downright disappointing.” The man pulled me away from the hole and walked me over to the corner of the room. He drug me so forcefully that I was tripping over every step.  He sat me in the corner of the room and left without saying another word.

I couldn’t see much out of the windows while sitting on the floor. The clear skies outside told me it was still mid-day. The fog wouldn’t roll back into this area until the later part of the afternoon. It wasn’t even 5 minutes later when I heard footsteps coming back my way from the other room.

The older man was the first man through the door, followed by Dan, and then two guys that looked close to our age. The first looked older than his years.  He dressed like a farmer; he wore dirty overalls and an equally dirty t-shirt, and had leathery skin from too much sun exposure. The other appeared more backwoods with an overgrown mullet haircut, wearing jeans and what was once a white t-shirt. Dan’s face was bruised, and there was dried blood on his shirt. Mayhem wasn’t with him. As soon as he saw me his steps quickened, and he dropped to the ground next to me. With our hands bound behind us we couldn’t hold each other, but seeing him was such a relief.