Rise & Walk (Book 2): Pathogen (7 page)

Six

The sickly glow of streetlights illuminated patches on alternating sides of the road.  The orange radiance provided enough light that Mason was able to drive at a moderate pace without his headlights.  The eyes of the party, except the elderly newcomer, had adjusted well to the darkness.  Nikki, eyes wide with anticipation chose to ride in the bed of the truck with Tony.  She now wore a jacket that she brought from home to brace her against the cool evening.  She had mimicked Tony’s actions when he jumped into the back of the truck.  Rather than sit in the bed, Tony stood behind the passenger’s side and kept a forward lookout with his hand holding tight to the open rear windowsill.  Nikki, not knowing what to do in her emotional state, copied Tony by standing in the same manner behind the driver’s side.  Something ahead caught Tony’s attention.  He bent down quickly, the speed of his action causing Nikki’s heart to race as he stuck his head into the window to speak to Jack.  The truck slowed and Nikki saw a distant figure moving with a crooked stride.  She heard Mason grunt from within the cab as a slight squeal sounded from the tires. 

“What’s the matter?” Margaret whispered inside the cab.  Veronica found the old woman’s hand in the darkness and held it.

“It’s alright, we’re just being careful.” Veronica reassured.

“Nikki,” Mason said to Tony.  Tony stood back up and patted the blonde on her shoulder, signaling that Jack wanted a word.  She crouched down so that her head was level with the rear window.

“Yeah?” she questioned.

“Right at the end of this street?” Jack asked.

“Yep, then one block up on the left is the school.” She confirmed.

“Where’s that thing heading?” Jack asked while gesturing quickly towards the creature.  It shambled around the corner in the direction that Nikki had just described.

“Uh-huh.” She mumbled.  Mason quickly looked through the windows around the truck.  He caught Veronica’s eye and paused.  She nodded her encouragement.

“Okay, hold on back there.” Mason said.

Nikki stood and saw Tony holding the shotgun, pointing up in the air, his left hand straining to keep a tight hold on the windowsill.  He smiled at her for a moment, and then focused on the road ahead.  The truck began moving slowly at first, then picked up speed.  The sound of the engine built up along with Nikki’s anticipation.  As the truck made the turn from Pershing Avenue onto Ridgeway, she felt her legs go weak.

Twenty yards ahead a crowd of tattered living dead stood three or four deep, grasping towards the gated entrance to the high school.  Their huddled forms spilled into the street for lack of access surrounding the front of the school entrance.  Each infected body scraped and clawed to get closer to the fence but their numbers were too many.  The straggling ghouls turned, aroused by the sound of the approaching Chevy and growled a broken chorus of hellish hunger.

“Oh shit” Veronica whispered.  Margaret froze in disbelief at her first glimpse of the living dead.  Her eighty-one year old heart paused for a moment causing her to lean forward as if a change in position would be less constricting.  She inhaled with a shutter as her pulse resumed.

“Damn,” Mason whispered.  He reached down, flicked on his headlights, and gunned the engine.  Tony’s hand slipped free with the sudden increase of speed.  He went down hard in the bed of the truck; his shotgun slipping from his grasp.  Nikki, not as top-heavy as Tony, was able to maintain her balance.  Her hopes for a reunion with her parents evaporated upon seeing so many ghouls.

The Chevy’s high-beams cut through the night revealing the state of the monsters.  Some were torn with wounds and hanging flesh, a couple had portions of their bodies charred black by flames, a few appeared only pale skinned with no visible injuries but they all shared a distant lifeless stare as the headlights panned across their mass.  They moved in stuttered jerks brandishing their cramped claws, longing towards the bright and noisy vehicle.  Margaret, horrified at the sight, brought her hands up and covered her mouth.  Veronica grimaced as she slipped her arm over Margaret’s shoulder, stretching her tender midsection. 

“So many,” Margaret cried.

Tony rolled over hard and leaned his back up against the wall of the bed, doing his best to fight the sudden sway of Mason’s course.  The truck veered to the right to avoid the gruesome crowd.  Nikki held fast to the rear windowsill as her body was thrown by the change in direction, towards the hungry creatures.  It was not her strength that saved her, rather the shock at the sheer numbers of the dead, some of which she now recognized, which froze her in place.  She dangled precariously over the press of gaping mouths and outstretched limbs, nearly gagging from the sight.   Tony reached out and grabbed her small hips, pulling her down into his lap, and clasped his arms around her like a living seatbelt.  They both looked in awe at the number of creatures attempting to grab the truck, but were spun around or fell as it sped on.  The engine pitched upwards with its effort and after a few tense moments, the vehicle was clear. 

Desperate, Nikki looked back towards the infected crowd.  A number of corpses stumbled to their feet, righting their unsteady remains with clumsy efforts.  Other creatures tumbled over the fallen like drunks playing a gory game of Twister.  Behind the rotting confusion and the few beasts that still gave feeble chase, was her besieged high school.  The once familiar hallways were silent and empty.  Adjacent to the building and surrounded by the same cyclone fence was the athletic field.  She saw many cars and trucks parked around the inside of the field, some pushed right up against the fence yet there were no lights on in the buildings.  The creatures seemed to be concentrated only in the front area.  She pulled away from Tony’s grasp and crawled towards the tailgate on all fours in the bustling truck bed.  Tony got to his knees and followed.  A light caught his eye and swung in a back-and-forth arc on top of the building.  Nikki saw it too and yelled over the engine noise.  A figure on the roof was signaling with a flashlight.

“There!” She pointed.

“I see it,” Tony shouted against the driving wind.  He dragged himself forward, back to the rear window.

Nikki stared hard at the figure in hope that its shape was familiar; that of her father or mother. She couldn’t recognize the figure but it was some comfort to know that there were people alive within.  She clung to the edge of the tailgate and watched the shadows of her old high school shrink in her view. 

“Stop and flash the lights.” Tony said poking his head in the cab, giving Margaret an unnecessary fright.

“Why?” Jack yelled.

“There’s a dude swinging a flashlight on the roof, we should acknowledge.”

Without slowing down, Jack flashed his lights on and off wildly a few times.  He looked to Veronica.

“What now?” Veronica asked. 

“Any ideas?” Mason said.

“Ma’am,” Veronica said to the old woman, “Are there any other places in town where people would go in an emergency?”

The woman considered for a moment and began to think out loud.

“We would have gone to the Plant in an emergency; that’s while my husband was an employee.  After he retired, we would have gone to the high school.  Some go to the hospital, but that’s people who work there of course.”

“Back to the hills I guess,” Jack said, “maybe we can hide out somewhere.”  Margaret thought for a moment and spoke.

“There’s one home up that way but the people there are not very nice.” She said shaking her head.

“What do you mean, Mrs. McCormack?” Veronica asked.

“The Richardson estate is the only place on that road, aside from the dam.  But I wouldn’t expect any help from them.  It’s just the Grandson that lives there now.” Margaret said, “His father left town a few years ago to run some other factory out-of-state.”

A weary smile appeared on Jack’s face.

“We should drop by; I don’t think they’re home.” Jack said.

Seven

Billy Tate dashed to join Gabe on the roof of the Whisper Lanes bowling alley with just enough time to see Jack Mason’s truck flash its lights and drive off towards the hills.

“See I told you it was Mason.” Gabe Duffy said, leaning on the small wall that bordered the perimeter of the roof.

“Who’re you talking about?” A young woman with bright pink hair asked while emerging from the hatch to the attic.  She set down a cardboard file-box used to hold documents.  Her eyes were bloodshot and tired.  She pushed the box to the side next to three other boxes and exited the hatch.  The hard rubber soles of her bowling shoes made crunching sounds as she walked on the gravel covered roof.

“Guys from our paintball team.”  Billy said, “They made it back to town.”

“It figures they’d make it.” Gabe said smiling.  He thumped a fist on the wall, happy to see his friends then realized that Billy wasn’t smiling.

“Sorry man.” He said to Billy.

Billy turned away without comment.  Gabe watched the Chevy’s lights dim in the distance.

“Where does that go?” Gabe asked the girl. 

“Back into the hills, or towards some private property and the Dam.”  She said lifting a cardboard box.  She looked around the roof and chose an area next to the wall towards the back of the building.  She set down the box and licked her finger.  She lifted her wet finger to check the prevailing wind.  Billy picked up a box and brought it to her.

“Jinx right?  You said your name was Jinx?”  He said setting down the file box near her.  She looked annoyed.

“Jinxy. My name is Jinxy.” She corrected as she opened a file box and placed the cardboard lid down to kneel on.  She began to remove documents and receipts and spread them out on the roof.

“What are ya doing?” Gabe asked as he approached.

“I’m gonna sleep up here.” She said while continuing to pile the papers in a small area as protection from the rough surface of the roof.

“Up here?”

“Yup.  With that lid closed.” She said with a slight twang as she pointed a finger to the hatch.

“You don’t have to do that.” Gabe said, “They can’t get into the bathroom, so they sure as hell can’t get up into the attic.”

Billy became very quiet and moved towards the hatch, disappearing within.

“Don’t care.” She said firmly, “I ain’t staying in there.”

“It’s gonna get cold out here.” Gabe said.  Jinxy threw back her short bobbed hair with a laugh.

“You don’t know cold.  I’ll be fine.” She said as she slid the other box around and placed where she wanted.

Another file box appeared at the hatch to the roof.  Billy emerged and brought the box to an area about ten feet away from Jinxy’s.

“I’m gonna sleep up here too.”  He said passing Gabe, “It’s just too weird with Travis down there.”

Jinxy brought another box to her area.  She gestured with the box.

“There’s probably twenty five years of records in there: plenty for all of us.”  Jinxy said.  “I’m gonna make a wall to keep out the wind.”

Gabe shrugged.  He knew it would get colder as the night wore into morning but thought it best that they all stayed together.

“We’ll I’m not staying in there alone.” He said and started towards the hatch mumbling, “What the hell kind of a name is Jinxy anyways?”

Landa May Rinks had gone by the name Jinxy since the age of thirteen.  As far back as she could remember she hated her real name.  It sounded to her like a great place to go Ice Skating, ‘Landa-Rinks,’ but not a proper name for a human being.  When her mom remarried a beer-bellied, unkempt man named Duane June, the owner of the local bowling alley, the thirteen-year old almost ran away from home.  She feared that she would have to also take his name and be known forever as Landa May June; not a shame she could live with.  Landa hated a lot of things before her mom married Duane. She hated that she never knew her father.  She hated that her drunken mother had no idea who her father was.  She hated growing up under a leaky roof in a trailer park and having to change out the catch-buckets in the middle of the night.  She hated waking to cold mornings in a tin-home that never seemed to get warm enough.  There was also the shortage of everything, especially decent food that left her with little enjoyment in those formative years. 

Summers in Whisper were more tolerable.  She didn’t wake up in the cold and have to fight off the desire to stay under her blankets.  She would steal apples from Old Lady McCormack’s backyard; pears from Mr. Burrows’ front yard, and even pomegranates, split ripe in the sun from the window of little Timmy Erwin’s tree house, not for fun but added sustenance.  The fruits were a welcome addition to a diet heavy on instant noodles, generic cheerios, and Friday’s fish-sticks.  There wasn’t much Landa May could do about her situation.  Even education seemed to hold little opportunity for those born tragically destitute.  It’s hard for a kid to do well in school; to better oneself and escape their situation when they’re so often cold, tired, and hungry.

But the community of Whisper had some programs to help local teens deal with boredom and stay out of trouble.  The community found that providing funds for teens to keep busy was more cost effective then having their limited police force keep track of troubled kids.  It was in one of these programs that Landa May found her salvation.  On her thirteenth birthday, she entered the Whisper lanes bowling alley to take part in the teen bowling club.  Every day from nine in the morning to five in the evening, the teens of Whisper could bowl, free of charge until their eighteenth birthday.  Landa May quickly mastered the fundamentals and within two months had beaten every other member of the teen club.  Not only did she show a masterful accuracy with her throw, but also had a knack for throwing others off their game with smart-assed remarks.  When Duane June, saw her streak of wins, he proclaimed her bad-luck to any opponent.  Bad-luck Rinks soon morphed into Jinx; which only lasted a week or so before she decided to embrace the idea.  She altered the nickname further and Jinxy was born; a name she created, owned, and could be proud of.

Duane, once a professional bowler in the eighties, told her that if she worked hard, she could become a professional too.  At first she didn’t put too much faith in the disheveled man’s words.  Her skepticism was bolstered by his liberal use of profane expressions.  She would never forget how he put it; “If you have the balls, you’ve got a shot in the game.”  He reeked of perpetual scotch-breath but he did earn a lot of money before drinking the bulk of it away.  He told her that she could win big prize money if she made it to a tour.  Jinxy had found hope that bowling could become her way out of Whisper; out of the leaky tin roof of her trailer park; out of the gutter.

By the end of that summer, her mom had dumped her scumbag boyfriend Ricketts, and had slouched herself shamelessly towards Duane.  They shacked up by Christmas and Jinxy had herself Twenty-four hour access to the alley.  The situation was less than ideal but his home was a marked improvement over the trailer.  Hearing their drunken activities in the bedroom was a stomach turning event that no thirteen-year-old should ever have endured, but at least she was warm.  Jinxy found a way to adapt and keep practicing.

It wasn’t long before Jinxy realized the hopes that Duane and her mom came to have for her career.  Dollar signs seemed to reflect in their eyes when they looked at Jinxy, as so many parents of prodigies eventually do.  Jinxy decided to use their greed to help herself.  She started out with what would become an almost trademark bob of bright pink hair.  Her shiny Cotton-candy-pink hair was unmistakable in Whisper.  It was a statement that not only had she renamed herself, she had remade herself; more self-expression followed.  Jinxy found her own style and her own confidence on and off the lanes. She eventually talked Duane into allowing her to live at the bowling alley.  He built her a small room in the back, behind the pin-setting wall.  It wasn’t quiet during operating hours but it was hers; quiet, warm, and dry at night. 

Jinxy’s mom passed away three days before her eighteenth birthday.  She had passed out drunk in the kitchen of Duane’s home and split her head open on the stove.  Laying on the floor unconscious, she had vomited and choked to death while Duane slept in a stupor just twenty feet away.  Jinxy wasn’t surprised. 

She felt bad at losing her mom, but not as much as she thought she should.  She knew on some level that she might have found her mom in time had she still lived at Duane’s home, but she couldn’t make herself feel guilty about it.  She wanted to feel more, to cry, and miss her mom, but nothing stirred.  The woman wasn’t ever really there for Landa May.  After the funeral, she wondered what she would do.  Duane, still struck by her cash-winning potential, told her that she could stay at the alley as long as she wanted if she would accept him as a partner.  She remained at the alley and practiced like never before. 

Duane foot the bill for their trips to tournaments and once she started winning, she repaid him half her winnings.  She thought that the trips also helped him with the loss of her mother; even fat old drunks get lonely, perhaps more so than the sober.  Things had worked out well; better then ever actually.  Duane was a decent coach before his drinking got going; which was usually the first three hours of practice or a tournament.  Jinxy benefited from his professional experience and his gritty advice.  He told her over and over that she had to be tough; that she had to have “balls” when dealing with the other bowlers.  She appreciated how he never pretended to be her step-father.  There was no mistaking that he was just a little bit disgusting; a perfect match for her drunk of a mother.  But Duane treated her well and she couldn’t help but appreciate that.

Sunday had been a day like many others for Jinxy.  She had been practicing, as she did everyday, just wrapping up her third game of the morning when she heard a commotion from the lobby.  Commotions, scuffles, even full on brawls, were not unusual in a bowling alley, but not during the daytime.  She didn’t see Duane at the counter so she set down her ball and began walking to the lobby.

Jinxy saw Dan Bridger, in his paramedic uniform struggling with another man, an out-of-towner by the look of him.  Another Paramedic, she thought his name was Larry but she wasn’t sure, was almost hugging Duane.  She flinched when she heard Duane cry out in agony as Larry seemed to be biting his neck like some hideous jumpsuit clad animal.  The attacker pulled his head away, with it followed a scrap of flabby flesh.  Blood squirted out in a small stream smearing on the man’s face as he chewed the bit of Duane in his mouth.  Two other out-of-towners joined in and tried to separate Dan Bridger from the other man.  Dan bit the smaller man twice on the shoulder before a tall black man punched him hard on the side of the head.  She heard the other man say, “It’s like on the news?” and turn when Dan pulled him back down and bit him from behind.  Jinxy screamed as Duane, his tee-shirt stained with his own blood, grunted and rammed his attacker, lifting him off his feet.  Duane’s booze-blubbered form drove the hungry beast out the front door. 

She ran towards the front, to escape or perhaps to try and help Duane, she didn’t know which.  As she reached the glass doors she saw the man that was technically her step-father, Duane June now prone, contort and spasm as his blood trickled into a rain gutter built into the sidewalk.  His attacker rose from the twitching body and with bloody mouth agape, he approached the glass door. 

Without thinking, Jinxy spun the door lock closed.  The men struggling next to her succeeded in pushing Dan off their friend who was also a wounded mess.  He coughed blood as his head fell back limp.  The black man was in shock and called out to the fallen man.  Dan growled another horrid, bubbly sound and moved forward.  The sight was just too much for Jinxy.  She ran to the desk and dialed Nine-one-one.  When she saw that the two men were following her and Dan was following them, she decided to hide in the woman’s bathroom and let the cops deal with the situation.  If she left the phone off the hook, the emergency operator would send the cops to investigate.  With that plan, she led the two into the bathroom, the closest door with a deadbolt, and locked it behind them.

Inside a small closet off the bathroom that held cleaning supplies, spare towels, and mops, was also a ladder to the attic.  Jinxy had discovered it years ago while exploring.  Inside the attic was a hatch the led to the roof.  After about two hours without a police rescue, two hours of their assailants pounding on the door, Jinxy led the boys to the attic.  It was up there that they could hear the news reports from the television in the bar, echoing through the hollow attic space.  At first they didn’t believe what they heard about the spreading infection, until Gabe moved out into the dark areas of the attic.  He lifted up a ceiling panel and saw with his own eyes, their friend Travis in such a state that infection wasn’t a question.  He shambled about, followed by the paramedic.  The gory pair quickly noticed Gabe, apparently by smell and moved underneath to claw at the empty air.  If Gabe moved, they followed from below.  Travis couldn’t follow Gabe back to the floored area above the bathroom.  But even that wasn’t much comfort.  Soon Jinxy showed them the roof.  They watched in horror as Whisper fell to chaos.  Gunshots pierced the night, screams of the living, growls of the dead, and the cars racing out of the area saw to it that no one had any sleep.

During the next day, they napped uncomfortably inside the attic, taking turns sleeping and listening to the news coverage.  The coverage began to change.  Some reports spoke of the infected as having passed on; that the dead had risen to spread their infection.  These reports were quickly dismissed by officials but as time passed, more and more spoke of the risen dead.  The news was growing bleaker by the moment, and the attic seemed less of a sanctuary with the idea that the dead were ranging through the bowling alley.  All three had ventured outside for some fresh air and a respite from the news.