Saving the Dead (22 page)

He shined the light up on the restrained child.  The child was a boy of about four or five with a deep gash on his forehead.  He was covered in sticky blood from his wound.  Most importantly, he flinched back from the sudden light.  Zombies never flinched.

Ramirez placed his hand on the boy’s chest and could feel a pounding heart beneath his fingers.  The little boy hugged his hands to him and cooed with a big open-mouth grin.

He dropped the hot-drill as if it were a poisonous thing and shouted, “I need some help over here!”

In one quick motion, he cut the little boy free of his restraints and pulled him out of the carseat.

The little boy wrapped his arms around Ramirez’s neck.  His hunger was not for flesh that the dead craved, but for love and affection, a desire that was only a need of the living.

The child burst into grateful tears.  When Drifts and the other first responders arrived moments later, the child wasn’t the only one crying.

Chapter Ten

The Burden

“Well, there goes c-spine.”

“They’ll be okay,” said Ramirez.

The passenger of the van, who had suffered a concussion in the wreck, held onto her son sobbing.  Her little boy Evan, held her back just as tightly cooing.

Drifts rubbed at his eyes and Ramirez elbowed him. “You big softy.”

“Shut up.”  Drifts pushed him back.

Ramirez grinned at him under his own tear-filled eyes.  In fact, there wasn’t a dry eye in the room.  The mother’s bed was surrounded by the crew and the emergency room staff.  When the crew had arrived at the hospital with her little boy, she practically clawed her way out of bed to get to him.    

Evan’s mother looked up at them over her son’s shoulder with open tears streaming down her face. “Thank you.”

Drifts nodded and Ramirez smiled at her, “You’re welcome.”

He turned and left the room.  Drifts followed him only after sparing a moment to smile at a nursing intern.  From the spot where he leaned against the wall, Justin fell in step behind them. 

The paramedic student had been virtually silent since Ramirez had last seen him on the bumper.  Despite this, he remained more than helpful.  He even started the IV on Evan and got it on the first try as Ramirez supervised and held the boy’s arm still.

Out in the ambulance bay, Ramirez turned to face his student. “It’s quite a bit to take in, isn’t it?”

Justin nodded. “How did you end up doing this?”

Ramirez shrugged. “I always wanted to help people, and I just sort of fell into it.  For the most part, I think it’s just how I’m wired.”

“I can see that.  What about you, Sam?”

“Me?” Sam smiled. “I’m just in it for the fucking thrills.”

Ramirez shook his head. “I keep telling him that it wears off, but so far he’s been consistently intrigued by the ‘cool’ calls, and not very patient with the call that aren’t.”

Justin allowed himself a small smile. “I noticed.”

“Hey!”

Justin’s expression sobered. “I don’t know.  I’m not sure I can do this.”

“You don’t have to, Justin.  It’s a career path, not a prison term.  If you don’t want to do this, you can be done.  There isn’t any shame in it.  You’re not a failure.  It just means you’re not a paramedic.  Do you understand?”

Drifts spoke up. “Leo’s right, kid.  You went back and forth about this several times tonight.  Maybe this career isn’t for you?”

Ramirez spoke up. “I don’t know.  Maybe, maybe not.  As I said before, it’s quite a bit to take in.  I think Justin is just processing.  Personally I’m not prepared to state that his career in EMS is finished.”

Justin nodded. “I’m not either.  In truth, there is quite a bit about this that I enjoy.  I like helping people.  I don’t mind the messed up situations so much.  Although they are pretty foreign to my lifestyle on the ranch.  I like the medical skills, like starting IVs, giving meds, and those two intubations I’ve done tonight were awesome!  I mean, I’ve had classmates that haven’t done any of these things, and I’ve done two intubations in one night!  I was so pumped after that!  If that was all that I had to do, I think I would be fine.  It’s just . . .”

Ramirez finished for him. “You find using the hot-drill overwhelming.”

“Yes.”

“I understand, Justin.  I really do.  It’s the hardest aspect of the job.  Truth be told, I hate using it every time.  Do you know what happened to me the first time I had to use the hot-drill?”

The younger man shook his head.

“Now, please bear in mind that by the time they had introduced the hot-drill, I already had twenty years’ experience.  I’d just survived the outbreak and had been more than acquainted with death.  But the first time I took out the hot-drill and prepared to pull the trigger, I froze.”

Justin eyes bulged. “You froze?  You?”

“Bullshit!” Drifts exclaimed. “Really?”

“Really.  My partner, a much younger and greener medic, had to take the drill from me and do it himself.  I wish I could say that it was an isolated occurrence, but the next three incidents I found my courage failing.  I couldn’t pull the trigger.  At that time, I really was considering whether my time in the box had come to an end.”

Justin sat on the edge of his seat. “What happened?”

“I guess I faced my fears.  I decided if I couldn’t use the drill myself on the next call that needed it, I would hang up my medic patch and start a new chapter.  Soon afterward, I got my chance.  A ninety-year-old woman coded right there in front of us.  I knew I should use the drill but I insisted on waiting to the very last moment.  Finally I knew I couldn’t push it any further, so I put the drill to her head and finally pulled the trigger.  Thank God I did, because the instant before I did, her eyes popped open.”

“No fucking way,” Drifts and Justin said simultaneously.

Ramirez smirked at them. “It scared the crap out of me.  I promptly went to the nearest bathroom on the scene and threw up.”

Justin asked. “You did?”

“I did.  I also became a much bigger stickler for time.  But using the hot-drill is still hard for me.”

“It is?  But you use it so . . .”Justin was at a loss for words.

“Efficiently?” Ramirez finished for him. “I’ve had plenty of opportunities to get efficient at it, but it’s still hard.  I suspect that the day it isn’t hard will be my last day on the job.”

“Why’s that?” Drifts asked.

“Because, Sam, if it becomes easy, that means I lost touch with a part of my humanity that I hold dear.”

Drifts looked at his partner skeptically. “I don’t know if I agree with that, Leo.”

“I know you don’t, but you don’t have to.  That is the line that I personally hold myself accountable to.”

“I’m not sure if I can do this,” said Justin.

Ramirez shrugged. “I’m not sure either, but unless you’re wanting to quit right now, I’m still willing to give you more time to see.”

“Really?”

“If you want,” said Ramirez.

“Sure, but why are willing to give me time to figure it out?”

“You’ve shown potential.”

“I have?”

“Yes,” Ramirez said simply.

Drifts chimed in. “Yeah, you’re way less of a pain in the ass than some other ride-alongs.”

“Gee thanks.”

Drifts grinned at him. “Don’t mention it.”

Suddenly the crew’s pagers went off.  They looked at them and Ramirez asked, “So do you want me to call the sup in to give you ride back to the station?”

Without hesitation Justin said, “No, I’m with you guys.”

Moments, later the trio piled into their ambulance.  Drifts grabbed the mic. “Triple-Three en route.”

The radio squawked back, “Triple-Three, you are en route to Seventy-Eighth Street and Bourne on a general weakness, code one.

“En route.” 

Drifts gunned the engine and swerved out of the hospitals lot.  When they made it over a block away, he hit the lights and sirens.

“Turn right on McKinney.”

“You got it.”  Drifts turned the wheel while he lit a fresh cigarette.

Drifts exhaled a stream of acrid smoke. “You know what?  I’m getting pretty fucking hungry.”

“Are you now?”

“Damn skippy!  We haven’t had a break all fucking night.  What about you, kid?  You hungry?”

“I could eat.”

“I’m not talking about your date life.”

Justin snorted. “Oh!  Well, I’m hungry, too.”

Drifts and Ramirez grinned at each other.  Drifts shook his head. “Yeah, I know.  He’ll fit in just fine.”

Several minutes later they pulled up in front of a huge mansion surrounded by twelve-foot concrete wall.  Drifts stopped Triple-Three before the thick rod iron gate and gave a low whistle. “This would stop a truck from crashing through.”

“It would,” Ramirez agreed. “It’s mainly designed to stop hordes of zombies from pushing in.”

“Huh?  Is that a fact?  This would be a hardcore pad to stay in.  Why the fuck haven’t they opened the gate yet?”

He blared the horn.

“Um, Sam, I bet the house is soundproofed.  Why don’t you try the buzzer?” Ramirez said.

“Really?”

Ramirez gestured towards it. “Give it a try.”

“All right, but I think you’re high or something.  There’s no fucking way they couldn’t have heard our horn and sirens.”

Despite his protests, Drifts opened the window and pushed the button with an audible buzz.

Moments later, a woman spoke through the intercom, “Oh, thank God you’re here!  We were getting really worried that you wouldn’t get here on time.  I’ll let you in!  Just a second.”

Drifts stared at the intercom’s camera. “So you didn’t hear us blaring our horn out here?”

“Did you honk?  Oh, I guess I wouldn’t have.  The house was built with the state of the art noise cancelling technology.  We aren’t even bothered by fireworks on New Year’s and Independence Day.  Anyway, I’ll see you in a moment.”

The gate locks unlatched and started to crank open. 

Drifts drove the ambulance in. “Soundproof, huh?  How did you know that?”

Ramirez shrugged. “One look at this place tells me it was designed to keep zombies out for the long term.  The reinforced gates.”  He pointed up at several small patios that lined the upper floors. “Gun platforms along the roof level.”  He scanned along the inside wall.  After a moment he said, “Look over there at that small crane planted into the ground.  That’s used to raise a bait cage over the wall.  Probably to draw a horde away from the gate so a truck can make a supply run.”

“Okay, I get it.  Nice digs for living out the apocalypse but why soundproofing?” asked Drifts.

Ramirez said, “It’s the first thing I would have installed after constructing the walls.”

“Why’s that?” asked Justin.

Ramirez looked between them. “Neither of you have ever been around a horde of moaning zombies before, have you?  During the outbreak, the moans of a horde drove more than a few people insane.  Don’t give me that look, Sam.  I used to think it was hogwash, too, until one day my scavenging crew and I were cut off and surrounded by a horde of zombies.  Four of us had to take refuge in a treehouse with close to five hundred of those things below us.  We couldn’t do anything but listen to that constant grating noise.”

Ramirez shivered with the memory. “After the second day, a guy on my squad named Butler had gotten so tweaked out that he threw himself out of the tree to the zombies below.  He might have screamed.  I don’t know, I couldn’t hear it. In truth, I knew how he felt.  After the day was over, I started to envy him.”

“How did you get out of there?” Justin asked.

“We were lucky.  Another scavenger crew happened by in a truck and saw our stranded flag.  They mowed a path through the zombies and got us out of there.  They took us back to the warehouse district that we had secured as a community.  Even when I was back safe with my family, I still had a hard time sleeping.  I kept hearing that sound every time I closed my eyes.”  He shook his head and his eyes took a faraway cast to them. “I still do sometimes.  Another member of my scavenger squad, Susan, didn’t fare as well.  She was tough as nails.  I saw her face down three runners at once and, I kid you not, take them all down with nothing more than a chair leg.  That being said, something about that incident had gotten itself under her skin.  She couldn’t shake it.  A few days after we had got back she took her own life.  At least she did it right, gunshot to the head just right so she wouldn’t turn.”  He shook his head. “It was her nine-year-old son who found her.”