The Living Dead Series (Book 2): World Without End (17 page)

Ian said. “I knew. The doctor told me about him but we still had to try. It was the best option she had and it seems to have worked. If she’s walking by tomorrow I’m going to find a way to leave. We lost Atlanta and the CDC so I don’t know when we’ll have transport going south again but hopefully something will come up.”

“I need to get out too. I’m thinking I’ll try to get to rural Pennsylvania and see if we can find an isolated house there.”

“Pennsylvania might work. Almost anywhere inland is going to be safer than the coast. I’m not at all certain that the earthquakes are over and before everything went to hell, some scientists were saying that the Caribbean seafloor spread was going to continue and get worse. We’ll probably have more tsunamis, bad ones.”

“I’ll keep that in mind. I had no idea the seafloor was spreading.”

Brian said, “It’s like the Great Rift Valley in Africa, except underwater. It ties in with continental drift.”

“Right. We’re not exactly lucky right now, are we? Still, we have to play the hand we’re dealt. When I was a boy I used to spend a week with my grandparents in the summer. My grandfather would read aloud from the Bible every night before we went to bed and I’ve never forgotten one of the verses. ‘There shall be famines, and pestilences, and earthquakes, in divers places. Let them that be near Judaea flee into the mountains.’  I remember wondering who Judaea was and thinking I was glad that we were already in the mountains.”

“It sounds like a good place to be.” Bea said.

“I hope it will be. I’m going to say goodnight. See you in the morning.” Ian gathered his family and left, a child over each shoulder and one hanging on to his leg.

Bea turned to Brian. “Ok, boy genius. We should turn in for the night too. How are the shoes holding up? Show me.”

Brian lifted his heel and showed her the worn bottom of the scavenged Converse tennis shoes. She had to find him some better shoes. It wouldn’t hurt to have several pairs in larger sizes and keep them on hand. And clothes. And medicine. Without penicillin any of them could get a paper-cut and die if it became infected. In a matter of a few days they were, for all practical purposes and outside of this facility, back in the dark ages of medicine.

“Bea, we need to leave soon.”

“I know. I’m trying to work it out. I need a place for us to go and transportation to get there.”

“No, I mean we need to leave
really
soon. There isn’t a whole lot of time.”

“Brian, I know but-”

“The Potomac river is gone.”

“Gone where?” She sat back down.

“Just gone. Disappeared. It happens sometimes just before or after an earthquake. The ground shifts and an entire river or maybe a lake sinks and goes underground.”

“How do you know the river is gone?”

“The soldiers. I heard them talking this morning and they said it disappeared overnight. Someone saw it from a helicopter. Something is happening or is going to happen soon. We should leave.” He looked at her as if he expected her to pack up and leave this minute.

“Okay. I understand. But we can’t leave at night, Brian. It’s going to be bad enough during the day. At night we won’t even have a visual advantage over the dead. How soon do the earthquakes happen after-”

“I don’t know! No one knows for sure but we need to leave. I don’t think the soldiers know why the Potomac went away but they’re getting ready to evacuate anyway.”

“Yeah, I think you’re right. I was hoping to hitch a ride out of the city when they do. It’s going to be hell if we have to walk out. Let’s sleep on it. I really can’t think of anything else to do right now.”

Brian stomped angrily down the hall. “I’m tired of sharing a room with you.”

“Not as tired as I am of having to share a room with you. You make chewing sounds in your sleep, Brian, and you snore.”

“You’re weird-looking and you snore too, loud.” He shot back over his shoulder, now walking faster.

She chased him into the office they were using for a bedroom, pushed him down onto the sofa and sat on him.

“Take back what you said.” She said, trying to pin his arms down and tickle him at the same time.

“I won’t! You sound like a rhinoceros.” he shouted, laughing and out of breath.

After they checked all of their supplies again, they settled down for the night, backpacks within easy reach in case they needed their weapons and talked desultorily of where they wanted to go.

“We could live in the desert, in those stone dwellings the Anasazi carved into the cliffs. They climbed up into them and then just pulled the ladders up when enemies came around. It would be perfect.” Brian yawned.

“Maybe. We would have to have a water source and food. We can’t grow crops in a desert.”

“I don’t like vegetables anyway. We’ll hunt. Rats, scorpions but only once we remove the stinger and the venom glands-” He said sleepily.

“Brian, shut up and go to sleep.”

“
You
shut up. I’m planning our meals. Armadillos, rattlesnakes, maybe some of those aliens from Area 51 if we get really desperate, desert pumas…”

She tuned him out and he finally went to sleep. Once again the night was quiet. Bea lay awake, wondering if an earthquake was really imminent. If one hit, this entire facility could cave in and who knew if they would be able to dig themselves out. And when and if they were able to she knew what would be waiting for them when they emerged.

Dogs barked in the distance and she thought of the tales that animals often knew before people did that an earthquake was coming. Whatever the case, there was nothing to be gained from losing sleep over it. Maybe tomorrow she could find transport out.

She fell asleep and dreamed she was riding a motorcycle along a straight, empty road. Brian was on the seat behind her wearing a dark helmet and holding on to her waist tightly. Too tightly. When she turned to tell him to loosen up, she saw blood dripping down his neck past the helmet onto his shirt. She pulled over and stopped, turning around just in time to see him push the visor up. Bloody strips of skin hung down from his mouth and he kept chewing hungrily, falling off the motorcycle then getting up, coming for her with arms outstretched. She tried to run but could only move in dream slow motion.

Brian woke up briefly and thought he heard someone crying. He listened but heard nothing else and went back to sleep.

~

“Today? No, I don’t think so. Mr. Dare, you mustn’t think that just because your wife is ambulatory that she is ready for discharge. Her health is still very, very fragile. If you took her and she collapsed, what would you do? There are no more physicians or emergency rooms just a phone call away.” Dr. Osawy continued looking over last night’s data from the monitors and the nurse’s notes.

It was still quite early and the doctor leaned against the wall, sipping coffee from a mug with a picture of a Dalmation on it. Ian had a rough night with all three children and felt like he was running on adrenaline this morning. Daniel had had nightmares from which he woke screaming, waking the other two. They all needed to get back to some sort of normalcy, somehow, so they could heal. Especially Daniel.

“Okay, I understand. But when?” Ian’s fists clenched in frustration. The woman would not give a straight answer.

“I told you before, I’m not sure. We have eliminated the Z-virus from her bloodstream however that doesn’t mean it isn’t still in her internal organs.”

“How are you going to test for that? Wouldn’t you have to operate?”

“Whatever we do will be as minimally invasive as possible. Needle biopsies, scrapings using a scope. Don’t worry. She is very important to us.”

“She is more important to
me
. What if I told you I’m going to take my entire family, including my wife, and leave tomorrow afternoon? What if a helicopter is scheduled to do a fly-over of the CDC and this was our last chance to get south?”

The doctor finally looked up at him. She was a small woman but her assurance and air of authority made her seem bigger. She stepped closer, almost touching his chest. Ian looked down, noticing the make-up caked in the fine wrinkles around her slightly bloodshot eyes.

“If those hypothetical situations were true then I would tell you that we will not let your wife go until we have everything from her that we need. She’ll be tested, analyzed, turned inside out if that’s what we need to do. This is not about personal freedoms, it’s about the greater good. If you want to take the rest of your family and leave you are welcome to do so but she is not going anywhere until we say so.”

Ian was momentarily speechless, unable to believe what he just heard. Dr. Osawy turned away and spoke to the soldier keeping watch outside the room.

“Corporal, No one is to visit the patient without verbal permission from me. That includes family members.”

She turned back to Ian. “It’s going to be easier on her if you cooperate. Peace of mind and a positive attitude can make a big difference when a patient is recovering. We really do want her to get better, Mr. Dare, and we’re not monsters here. Nevertheless, she is still a means to an end.”

“What do you want from her?” He spoke through clenched teeth.

“Only what you would expect. At best a means to create a vaccine or antidote, at least a clue to point us in that direction. We still believe that, given a little time, her immune system will mount an antibody response. That would be of benefit to millions. If you can play along I have no problem with letting you and the children back in to see her. I want her happy. We are trying to save the human race, Mr. Dare, and right now we’re losing.”

She made a few more notes on the chart she held and then left without speaking to him again. Ian contemplated shooting the guard and snatching his wife but realized he wouldn’t get very far. He needed a plan and he would need help.

He left to look for David Chambord.

B
efore he got to the end of the hallway a soldier, the blond giant he had seen sent out on various reconnaissance squads, pulled him aside. The man looked uncomfortable but determined to tell him something. He looked around before pulling Ian into one of the empty offices.

He spoke in a low tone. “You need to get your wife out of here soon if you can. This is not a doctor who hands out lollipops when she’s done with you.”

Ian asked, “What happens when she’s done with you?”

“The stuff I’ve seen, the experiments…
she’ll
try anything. The infected are not human to her, I’m not sure
we’re
human to her. Once she gets everything she thinks they need they’ll flay their patient alive. I’ve seen it happen.”

“Can you help me get her out?” Ian asked.

The soldier hesitated. “I can’t make any promises. The timing is-”

He broke off. Beatrice and her brother walked by and seeing them in the office, stopped. Ian noticed that her usually clear, green eyes had violet shadows underneath and her hands, balled into fists, were stuffed deep into the pockets of her jeans. Both she and her brother wore the same wrinkled clothes they wore every time he saw them and the boy had on a pair of cloth tennis shoes that had seen better days.

“Ian? How is your wife?” Bea asked in a low tone. She gave the soldier a quick look before turning back to Ian. She seemed to want the soldier to go away but he didn’t leave.

“Better. Not completely out of the woods but better.” He had no intention of telling her the whole story and really wished she would leave so he could talk to the soldier.

“That’s good to hear. I need to ask you something. I need to see if…” She trailed off then glanced at the soldier again and seemed to make up her mind. “Tell them, Brian.”

Reluctantly Brian told them about the Potomac. Ian asked the same questions Bea had and Brian grew frustrated.

“There’s no way to know how soon it’s coming. I just know the river is gone and that’s a clue.”

“It’s not that surprising given what’s been going on in the Caribbean. There was a good-sized earthquake swarm down there a week before the big one hit and there was a small swarm in South Carolina just a few days ago. You can’t always feel them. We could have easily had little ones here. Almost no one’s been paying a whole lot of attention to the data from the USGS lately.” The creases in the soldier’s forehead deepened as he spoke.

Bea asked him, “What will an earthquake do to this shelter?”

“I don’t know. It might be okay but it was built a long time ago. The biggest problem I see is the surrounding terrain. Large parts of the District of Columbia were built over marshy areas and diverted rivers. A lot of the land here is fill land, wet areas that were built up with rocks, soil, sand or other debris. In a landscape like this, when an earthquake hits, the problem is-”

“Liquefaction.” Brian said almost in a whisper.

“Exactly. The ground shakes so violently that the soil itself becomes liquid. Cars, buildings, streets, and yes, bomb shelters can be swallowed up in just a few seconds.”

Again Bea felt the weight of the earth above and around them as if it were pressing in on her. She hated being trapped in enclosed spaces. If an earthquake was coming she would rather be out in the streets, trying to escape instead of being buried alive in here.

“You know,” the soldier said reflectively, “When I was out last night running some wires through a weakened part of the fence there was quite a light show in the sky. I’d never seen anything like it before. It made me think of the Northern Lights you sometimes see near the magnetic pole.”

“They might be earthquake lights. Scientists wouldn’t admit they were real until they were finally photographed in the 1960’s before and during a series of earthquake swarms in Japan.” Brian said. “I want to see them. Can I go with you if you go back out tonight?”

“Absolutely not.” Bea said. “So that’s another indicator?”

“Sounds like it. I wonder who else knows this. Maybe we should speed up the evacuation and get out before everything hits.” Ian looked really worried now.

“That’s why we wanted to talk to someone. I know you guys are getting ready to evacuate (the soldier nodded) and you are leaving too, Ian. Is there any way that Brian and I can catch a ride out of the city?” Bea said.

“Let me talk to David. I think they’ll take you when they leave-”

The soldier interrupted him. “Not necessarily. We know it’s soon but we’re waiting for the final roster sheet. We’re breaking up into smaller groups. Some go to Cheyenne-, I never said that.”

“I think it’s safe to say that Cheyenne Mountain is an open secret. We’ve all been to the movies.” Bea said.

“Regardless, the situation is fluid. Every shelter and command center we have is under attack and most, like Quantico, we have simply lost. The virus multiplied so quickly and we didn’t understand that to start with which meant our ranks were easily infiltrated and ripped to shreds.

The day the announcement was made the commissary was jam-packed with everyone stocking up on food and supplies. Fights broke out, especially over infant formula and diapers.

Early in the afternoon we closed the barricades around the base and doubled patrols around the perimeter but of course the virus was already inside with us. No one knows who or where exactly but the first contact I had with it came from a domestic complaint call in the old section for married housing. I had pulled MP duty that day with my buddy, Paul. The military is really good now about offering counseling for families that need it but still we get called to our fair share of domestic violence scenes and this one seemed pretty routine when the call came in.

Pretty routine until we got there. The neighbor who called it in was outside waiting for us to show up. She said the screams had stopped but no one had emerged from the house and they weren’t answering the phone. She had seen the family the day before at a hockey game over near Dale City. Both families had boys playing in this particular league and it had been a routine game except that the ten year old had been bitten by a player on the opposing team. She said she knew for a fact that her neighbor had taken her son to the ER to have the wound cleaned and dressed and apparently the attending physician gave the boy a tetanus shot as well. The husband had been deployed to Afghanistan two months ago.
That
was a new piece of information.

Of course everyone had seen the announcement by then and it was pretty obvious what the woman was thinking even though she didn’t come right out and say it. My buddy called for medical back-up but went ahead and tried to rouse the family. We got no response. A blue minivan was parked in the driveway and had those sticker families on it showing a Mom, a Dad, two kids, a cat and a dog.

A little wooden plaque by the door read ‘The Bryants’. A sandbox in the shape of a turtle had tipped over, spilling sand across the walkway leading to the door. Plastic shovels and sand buckets littered the yard. We tried the door and found it unlocked. Even before we went in we could smell it. A thick, cloying smell of decay like road kill on a hot summer day.

The boy came at us as soon as we let the door close. It was dark in there and our eyes hadn’t adjusted yet so it was like he came out of nowhere. He latched on to Paul’s leg and bit through his trousers before Paul could shake him off. Neither of us wanted to hurt him, I mean who wants to use deadly force on a child? But the kid kept coming and pretty soon his little sister, organs blooming out of her abdomen and lips chewed off, joined him. Both children were emitting a sort of high-pitched gibbering. She managed to bite Paul on the ankle and he screamed and shook her off, unintentionally throwing her up against a set of tall bookshelves that tipped over on her. Only her legs were visible now and they soon stopped moving.

In the meantime I had the boy on the floor with my knee in his back, cuffing him. That kid was
strong
and never stopped trying to bite me. I found a dishtowel in the kitchen and gagged him.

We found the mom in the bathtub, brains splashed against the tile, gun still in a limp hand. She left a note telling her husband how sorry she was and having failed to protect her children, decided to join them in death. Her arms and hands were covered with bite marks from small mouths.

The medics showed up about then and transported the boy to the Navy hospital. I didn’t have time to follow up but I’m assuming they put him in some type of quarantine. They took Paul too and I never saw him again.”

“So they transferred you over here?” Bea asked. “What happened to the base?”

“It’s
theirs
now. Dear God, you should see some of the barracks.  Entire platoons went to bed and were never seen alive again. We chained the doors so they couldn’t get out and then we left.” His eyes looked haunted with loss and grief.

“So with so many losses you should be able to make room for two people?” Bea pleaded.

“It’s not that simple. We lost pilots too. That leaves us with only a few to fly us out of here now but I’ll help you if I can. I’ve got duty this afternoon so if you’ll excuse me.”

He left and Bea tried to feel optimistic but it was a struggle. Brian wandered off to look for breakfast, leaving her alone with Ian. He was looking at her as if evaluating her and Bea was embarrassed. She knew she and Brian needed more clothes but almost everyone was looking a little disheveled if not actually dirty these days. Did he think she had walked across a dead-infested city with a full suitcase?

He spoke. “Bea, if I could get you and Brian a ride as far as West Virginia, would you consider doing me a huge favor? It would be dangerous but we both know we have to get out of here now.”

“How dangerous? Would it involve Brian being in danger? I can’t-”

“I want you to pretend to be my wife this afternoon. Do you own a hat?”

“Um. Yes.”

“Good. Here’s what I’m thinking.”

The plan, once Ian outlined it and then fleshed it out, was simple enough. He was going in to see his wife and Bea and the children would go in with him. Once there, she would change clothes with Virginia and take her place in the infirmary. Ian would then catch the chopper going south and would take Brian with them. There was a refueling stop in Bluefield, West Virginia and he would be sure that Brian stayed there in safety while waiting for Bea who should arrive a few hours after that once she got out on the next helicopter this evening.

“What if they notice the switch?”

“That is the biggest possible failure point and if it happens we’re screwed. I’m hoping the doctor will buy my ‘I’ll be a good boy’ act and not feel she needs to monitor the visit. The guards are posted outside the room so I’m hoping they’re not that familiar with my wife’s face. There are probably more weak spots in the plan since I just came up with it but I think it will work. You’re close to the same size otherwise I wouldn’t even try it.”

Bea refused to think about how angry the doctor and others would be when they found that their patient had flown the coop but she doubted they would do anything to her. While they had never been especially friendly, they
had
allowed them to stay. The main thing was that she was getting Brian out of here. If they could just find someplace safe to go after that.

Ian left, looking for David to iron out flight details, and Brian came back with somewhat stale bagels, a pat of butter and orange juice. While she ate she explained everything. Initially he didn’t want to go but she persuaded him that this was their best shot at escaping the city. He was still sullen and for some reason he thought that she was treating him like a baby since she wanted him to leave with the other children.

“Brian, you’ll be armed with a revolver. I don’t think that’s exactly the way most people care for their babies. Or at least I hope they don’t.” She said dryly.

That cheered him up immensely and he was soon playing on David’s computer and trying to break into his protected files. She left him to it and continued searching offices and closets for shoes, certain he couldn’t break into any sensitive information but she was wrong.

“Bea, I got into the Z file! Come and read this.” He was so excited he practically pulled her down the hall.

The famous Marco Polo, along with his father and uncle, spent much of his life among the Mongols and Chinese and his tales of his travels were initially disbelieved by his fellow Venetians. It is believed by modern scholars that he did embroider the facts somewhat to make his tales more sensational but there was at least a kernel of truth in the heart of most of his stories. His notes give an interesting account of a city called Sharhr-i-Gholghola known variously as the Silent City, the City of Screams, or simply the Cursed City. According to the renowned traveler,

“The inhabitants of this City were practitioners of the abominable art of ‘soul collecting’ in which they murdered unsuspecting travelers after offering them succor for the night in their houses. Poison was placed into their skin by means of a small cut and a hollow reed and thus they brought about many deaths. This they did in quest of the great power they would gain by keeping these souls within their houses. The dead but still animated bodies of the unfortunate travelers were then released leagues away into the desert where they were sometimes seen wandering by the occasional traveler, many of whom reported vicious attacks by the soulless wanderers. They were said to be eaters of men.