Survival Instinct (2 page)

When Nadine came to, she simply laid where she was a moment, willing the room to stop moving. She had overdone it, but what choice did she have? Survival was about more than just fueling her system- killing that thing had been more important than searching for food and water. Now that the world had finally stopped spinning, she climbed carefully to her feet, rubbing her aching head where it had smacked the tiled floor as she picked up the bat once more and headed towards the door that led to the back room. She figured the manager wouldn’t care anymore- he was either dead or was more worried about his own survival than store policy at this point.

She was unsurprised to see the zombie in what had obviously been the store’s uniform in the break room. The picture was achingly clear, she thought as she quickly dispatched him
, bound him as she had the first and started dragging him to the corner where she’d left the other corpse. He’d obviously hunkered down here after being bitten, most likely by the undead thing she’d killed in the bathroom. Then he’d turned, and been stuck where he was, just as the other one had been trapped in the bathroom. While their survival instincts were obviously still present, basic motor skills like opening doors were a thing of the past. It was mildly interesting, but she found that she only cared as far as it related to her present situation. As long as she kept the doors closed, and there were no other things to deal with, she would be safe enough to recuperate here for the time being. Satisfied with the effort, she used the bathroom, washing her hands with a kind of obsessive glee before heading back to the break room.

Dazed, Nadine could only stare blankly at the feast before her. There were vending machines here, and three cases of bottled water. While the food in the refrigerator was spoiled and of no use, there was one bottled soda left, and
it happened to be her favorite, as though it had been waiting for her. She began to giggle helplessly, unable to control herself. She clutched her stomach and curled up into a chair, laughing like a maniac until the hysterics turned into waterworks. She sobbed uncontrollably, relieved to finally allow a break down- to feel something other than a half-numb terror.

She remembered her panicked flight from the morgue on base. Things weren’t too out of control yet, although she’d carefully avoided the men in uniform. It was obvious the military knew something was going on- the men with the hard, scared eyes wore respirators with heavy tanks on their backs, unsure what type of plague might befall them
or how it was transmitted. Many of them had red, watery eyes and coughed or sneezed as they let their eyes roam the land around them, searching for the threat- unaware that they were the danger, not the solution.

Finally she’d made it home, only to find Graham lying dead in the bed they’d so lovingly shared for the last three years. It didn’t dawn on her just yet that there was a connection to the current situation and the body of the man she’d loved beyond all reason. It was just another sign that life as she’d known it was a thing of the past.
She’d stroked his hair, singing the song they’d danced to the first night they’d met at a local bar off base, tears rolling silent and unchecked down her face. His hand was balled into a fist, and she smoothed it out, vaguely stunned to realize there was a note of some sort crumbled in that hand. She read it aloud, not even knowing she was doing so until the fifth time when everything clicked into place.

Attn: Soldiers who have received the COLDEX vaccine- watch for these signs:

Runny nose

Red nose

Watery eyes

Sneezing

Coughing

Relay
any of the above symptoms to your superior officer and report to the doctor on staff immediately. Thank you for your cooperation.

The note was unsigned, but it all made a horrible kind of sense to her grief-struck mind. The shot had done this. Her man, the love of her life, was dead because he and the other soldiers had been guinea pigs for this new and horrible vaccination against a fucking cold. Rage replaced her grief for the moment, and she was grateful, as it allowed her to think clearly. She had to return to the morgue- there were folders there, medical records in the rooms nearby as they shared a building with the infirmary and surgical suites. She would be able to find the answers she needed and maybe stop this before it went any further.

Nadine leaned down to kiss the cold lips of her fiancé
one last time when his eyes opened. Startled, she fell backwards off the bed, landing with a thump on her tailbone and letting out a cry of pain. She watched in horrible horror-movie slowness as Graham’s body sat up. His head turned and tilted down, unerringly locking his filmy blue eyes on her scared brown ones. Stiffly, he swung his legs off the bed as she grabbed the phone, forgetting that the military might now be the enemy, forgetting that the last thing she wanted to do was call them to come save her. But the thing that used to be Graham was quicker than she expected, and he pounced on her. Without hesitation, she saved her life, swinging the phone like a batter winding up to connect with the ball, and swung with all her might into the face of the man she had once loved.

Nadine calmed herself, systematically grabbing supplies and setting them on the table in the break room. She would eat- she was starving, literally- but there were things that must be done first. She wanted an honest idea of what was available here in the store, and what she could feasibly take with her when she left. Until then, food would have to wait. Her future survival was more important than stuffing her gullet with food when she might not have enough to last her more than a day or so.

The cabinets held several food items that, while not high in nutritional value, would still be useful to her until she found healthier things to eat. There were two bags of potato chips and one of tortilla chips as well as two jars of cheese dip- and these had peppers in them, so at least she’d be eating veggies, right? There were also three boxes of snack cakes that held six cakes each- eighteen cakes, three family-size bags of chips, and two jars of dip, not to mention all that beautiful bottled water.
Nadine casually swiped a hand under her lips, wiping the thin strands of saliva from her watering mouth. It was so much compared to the nothingness she’d survived on these last few weeks. She had an idea that if she’d stumbled into a food store instead of one that sold sporting goods her heart might have stopped at the thought of having to make such a difficult choice.

Nadine finally selected a bag of corn chips and a single jar of dip. She set a couple bottles of water within easy reach, yet allowed herself only two tiny sips to start with. She knew she’d only throw up if she guzzled down a full bott
le at this point, and that would only make things worse. When she was satisfied that she wouldn’t be ill, she took a couple more sips and then opened the chips. It was difficult to keep from scarfing them down by the salty handful, but once again she forced herself to stay in control. No one was going to take her food from her. No one was going to force her to quit- she could nibble all day long and into the night if that’s what she wanted to do, so going slowly, one meager bite at a time, would be to her benefit.

The chips were greasy in that delightful way only good corn chips could be, and even though this was food she had once avoided when offered something healthier instead, she couldn’t remember a time something had tasted better. She wished longingly for meat or fish, but she could survive on these for the time being.
She ate only two handfuls before her stomach bulged painfully and she set the bag to the side with a sigh of regret. Instead, she twisted the cap back on the spicy dip and set about looking for trash bags. The dip would need refrigeration now that it was open, so she needed to clear out the science experiment currently passing for leftovers before she’d risk combining good food with the spoiled.

When the break room was organized to her satisfaction,
Nadine grabbed a tool at random out of the store and prepared to break the plexi-glass windows of the two vending machines. She didn’t know how long she’d be able to stay, and she wanted to have a couple emergency bags prepared in case she needed to flee quickly. The work was taxing, but she was feeling stronger from her meal, small though it was, and knew that there might not be a better time to prepare a bug-out bag than now. When she had an assortment of foods she thought would keep her going for a while longer, she sought out a large, comfortable knapsack and stocked it with bottled water before topping it off with twice as many bags of chips, cookies and candy bars. Then she prepared five other bags in the same fashion until all the water was packed except for three bottles that she left out for her immediate use and stashed the bags in various locations that she could use as a means of escape if necessary.

Finally satisfied with the day’s work, Nadine unrolled four sleeping bags and spread them one atop another until she had a nice thick pile by the door to the break room. She left a fifth one rolled up to use as a pillow and snacked on a candy bar before polishing off another bottle of water and curling up in her nest of bedding. She’d slept in some horrible places these last three weeks- abandoned cars and empty houses for the most part. She’d managed to find a barn to bed down in for two days when her journey first began, and one horrible, rainy night she’d slept in the branches of a tree. This was the closest she’d come to being comfortable since her world fell apart, and she was horrified by the thought that she might not be able to actually relax.
Her concerns were unfounded- she was exhausted from all the energy she’d expended that day, and she found herself drifting into a light doze as soon as she shut her eyes.

But the relief was short-lived. Just before Nadine went under into a restorative slumber she heard a noise unlike any she’d heard before. All had been eerily silent the last few weeks, aside from the occasional shuffle of undead feet and the strange chuffing noise those things made as they tried to scent out prey. It took her a bit to process the sound, but the moment she did she leapt to her feet, trying to figure out what to do. The sound was human- someone was calling for help.

There was a small window
just before the break room that looked out across the alley separating the sporting goods store from the strip mall on its other side. Nadine went to it, grabbing a small stepstool that was most likely used by the staff to stock the higher shelves. She could see a woman actively involved in a fight for her life outside the drug store. She had a pistol of some sort and was firing it with startling accuracy, but it was a double-edged sword: as soon as one fell, two more took its place. She would be overrun if Nadine didn’t help her.

She hopped off the stepstool and swung it once, twice and finally a
third time until the glass was gone, and then climbed back up again to call the woman to her. She’d obviously heard the noise and was making her way over to the sporting goods store Nadine was calling home for the moment, but she was still more than twenty feet away and completely surrounded. Even worse, the creatures closest to Nadine had also heard the commotion and were stumbling around beneath the window, attempting to find a way inside. She fought back the panic- it was too late to change anything. It would all be for nothing if the woman didn’t make it.

“Run! Come here- I’ll pull you in!” Nadine shouted and her voice was rusty from lack of use. The woman gestured with her free hand that she heard and began making her way to the window in a serpentine fashion, trying to dodge the grasping hands of the undead. Nadine ducked back inside long enough to grab a long-handled hoe and then climbed back up, swinging the tool down on the heads of the closest bodies. She managed to clear three of them before one of them raised an arm for her and managed to dislodge her weapon. It startled her for a moment, but the woman was less than ten feet away now and getting closer by the second. She snatched another hoe from the pile and repeated the process, not caring about anything but getting the woman
to safety.

It would be good to have company, she thought as she took out another two of the shuffling corpses. She’d been alone for too long, and in the creepy silence of the night she often wondered if she was the only one left alive. She knew it wasn’t true, but thoughts of that nature always seem to be more realistic after dark.

The woman was now only two feet from the ledge of the window Nadine leaned out of, and they could almost have grasped hands at this point. A quick look showed her a woman about her age with dirty, matted red hair and a pretty, dirt-streaked face. She was wearing the tattered remnants of a grey tee shirt and jeans, and a pair of startlingly new boots, not unlike the ones Nadine had been eyeing in the sporting goods store. Her thin arms were nonetheless strong, the small muscles standing out in sharp relief as she swam through the horde and towards Nadine’s outstretched hand. She reached up and their fingers touched. The woman let out a high-pitched wail of agony, and Nadine watched in horror as the creatures fought over the leg they’d ripped off of her. Stunned, she let go, dropping the woman to her death as the mass swarmed over her, their mouths dripping blood and saliva as they ravaged her body.

Numb, Nadine scrambled down from her perch and sat against the wall under the window, unable to understand what happened. The woman had been safe- Nadine was so close to pulling her inside. What the Hell had gone wrong? She sobbed, trying her best to stifle the sobs with her hands as the icy shell that protected her from the horrible sight shattered.
She’d never learned the woman’s name. She cried- for the woman she never got to meet, the life the woman wouldn’t live, but she was also crying for herself. She almost had someone to travel with, another woman who might be a friend to her, and support her in her pregnancy. Now she was back at square one, alone, afraid and doubting her own survival for the first time.

What did the future hold for a woman like her? How the Hell was she supposed to raise a baby during the end of the world as she’d known it? God, would she even be able to hole up somewhere and deliver her child, or would those things get her while she labored? The image of those things that were once people performing an impromptu caesarian section tried to rise to the forefront of her mind, but Nadine forced it down ruthlessly. She couldn’t fall apart- not now. Later when she was safe she could indulge in all the hysterics she wanted, but for now she had a broken window just waiting for one of those creatures to get lucky
and find a way in. Dull slaps resounded against the brick wall behind her as they sought a way in after her. Something must be done, quickly.

Nadine found a hammer and nails in the backroom and thanked God that they’d once worried about such mundane affairs as tornados and hurricanes. It took her twenty minutes, and she panted lightly as she returned her the nest of sleeping bags she’d so recently vacated when she thought she might be able to save a life and make a friend. With one fist pressed tightly to her heart and the other clenched to her mouth, she cried herself to sleep.