Afflicted: Patient Zero Read online

  Alice stays glued to the opposing wall and tries to shut her fear up, covering her mouth with both of her grimy hands. The thing’s breathing intensifies, spraying me in the face like a fan. Man, it smells like rotted flesh and raw sewage. Wish I had a Tic Tac or some gum right now.

  It breaks from the doorway and lunges at me like a depraved lion; hitting me in the stomach hard like a linebacker and knocking me against the wall and then to the floor , sending an array of stars floating about in my peripheral view.

  Damn it, where’s my Glock?

  It must have popped out of my hand when I hit the wall. I try to look around for it, but the ravenous demon from hell is on me in seconds and the only thing keeping its mouth full of razors from digging into me is my boot, which I have lodged in his gut. Sure glad they’re not real bright; one quick move to the left or right and I might be a goner. To make matters worse, as if they could get any worse, the other thing sliding up the wall is gaining ground and I can nearly spot its disfigured body.

  Damn the infected are strong. My leg buckles a little and its head inches towards my face. Its arms swing erratically and those jagged fingernails are mere inches from my body. Looking into its black pools of nothingness, I see my reflection fighting back with all my might. Half of its face is gone, and its jawbone smacks up and down as it moans, yearning for my succulent flesh.

  Not today, asshole!

  I let go of its left, decayed arm, and grab its cold, slimy throat, pushing its head back as far as I can. It gurgles a little and its neck crackles like bubble wrap as I squeeze and thrust back, but this thing doesn’t seem to care if I snap it clean off. It still lunges forward.

  I look to my left and see the other unwanted caller fade in and out of the shadows down the hall. It looks, from what I can see, just as bad as the thing trying to get at me. It seems to be much more decayed and voracious, breathing heavier now that it knows I see it.

  And just my luck, if you want to call it that, I take my eye off the ball and the damn thing sneaks in a little closer and slices my shoulder good. It stings like an intense fiery pain nothing and immediately the thing finds its mark, pushing in for the kill. I throw everything I’ve got into my arms and legs. A single gunshot rings out that nearly makes me shit myself.

  The faint mist of the thing’s blood sprays across my face as it falls lifeless, again, to the left of me. Surprised, I cock my head to the right and see Alice standing there, shaking hard and my Glock dancing in her death-gripped hands. Her face is a scene of terror and shock all mixed up into one crazy looking expression. I’m not sure how she managed to pull it together to blow off that thing’s head, but I’m sure glad she did.

  Sitting there, with this rotted piece of mangled flesh draped across my legs, I wait for Alice to snap out of her trance and take out the other flesh-eater heading our way. But she just stands there, nearly lifeless and motionless like the infected.

  “Alice, snap out of it and shoot the damn thing already!” Yelling at her might not be the best idea considering that she doesn’t seem to be all there and my Glock could sound off at any time.

  Still no response. I’m not waiting for her to come back to the land of the somewhat living. I lean forward just enough to remove the knife that I had stowed behind my back. It’s nothing fancy and its size is modest at best, but considering that I’m currently stuck between a wall and a deadish corpse, it will have to do.

  I grab the small, serrated blade, and don’t even think of what I’m doing. It’s like it’s all second nature to me now, and trying to plot what I’m going to do will only get in the way. I flick my wrist and send the blade tumbling end over end through the darkness and towards the corpse.

  The dead man, or whatever the hell it is, stays its course and doesn’t even flinch as the knife hurls toward its head. Maybe it can’t see it in the shadows or perhaps its hunger for our flesh is driving it to walk through a meat grinder if need be. Whatever the case may be, I’m glad it’s not moving out of the way.

  The blade slams into its forehead, digging in deep through the soft, pliable tissue that some of the infected seem to have, and stops at the blunt end of the top of the handle. Instantly, the heavy breathing that played like a war drum stops and a loud thud echoes down the hall.

  Joy!

  Relieved for the moment, I work the dead thing off my legs and get to my feet. Alice still stands there, wide eyed and scared shitless, not moving a single muscle. How she has survived this long on her own is beyond me.

  I step to the side and carefully raise my hands towards the Glock, keeping an ever vigilant eye on Alice. I don’t know her from Adam and to be honest, I don’t trust her. At this point, everyone is on my “don’t test me” list.

  Alice remains still as a statue as I slide my hands over hers, opening up her fingers carefully and removing my Glock from her grasp. I grab the warm barrel and push it towards the ground as I swiftly maneuver the handle upward and out of her hands. She doesn’t even flinch, bat an eye, or even tell me to go to hell. I get nothing. She must be catatonic now. I wonder if she’s ever killed one of these things before, or anyone else for that matter.

  I eject the clip, for my own personal benefit, to make sure it’s still in working order. Being caught up in this horrid nightmare has made me such a paranoid freak; I hate being on pins and needles and acting like every little shadow is some demon out to collect my soul, but since awakening from my near death appointment, that feeling seems to be subsiding a little. I mean, I still don’t trust anyone right now, but my nerves seem to be sharpened, honed even.

  Good thing too as off down the hall and past the immobile corpse, I pick up the rumbling of multiple footsteps and that damn moaning. Man, I wish they would change that record. Maybe something with a better beat.

  I slip my Glock back into the front of my pants and contemplate retrieving my knife. I try to look through the darkness, but see what looks like one big, dead posse coming to get its outlaw. Trying to just survive in wherever I am is hard enough, I really don’t feel like playing Russian roulette over a knife.

  “Alice, we need to go, now!”

  She still stands there, frozen in time. I can see her lips fluttering about as if she wants to say something, but she just can’t pull it together long enough to spit it out. I could just leave her right there, dinner on a silver platter for the wolves coming our way. Hell, I don’t even know her. Just because she tagged one of the infected crawling on me doesn’t mean I owe her anything. It’s my good fortune, her tough loss. Forget this, I’m outta here.

  My eyes say see you later and I take off down the opposite side of the temporarily non-flesh-eating corridor. I continue to hear those things coming ever closer, their nails scrapping along the walls and their lips smacking like a ninety-year-old man looking at a tasty treat. I stop dead in my tracks.

  “Mike, you can’t leave her alone. You’re a better person, a better man than that,” a voice whispers inside my head.

  I know that voice, that sweet sounding tone that has melted me more than one time in the past. God, I wish I knew what was happening to me. What is happening here? It seems like a bad dream that I can’t wake from.

  I twist my head around and see a severely burned and disfigured corpse near Alice. Its black eyes focus on nothing but her, and its jagged teeth chomp up and down for her tasty flesh. She’s still motionless, like she’s ready to die or something.

  Damn it!

  I remove my Glock from the front of my pants and take aim at the flesh-eater that is all eyes on Alice. It doesn’t even know I’m there, or perhaps it just doesn’t care as it has found its current meal.

  With its mouth ajar and its teeth ready to sink into Alice’s pearly white skin, it lunges forward with its arms stretched out in front.

  I exhale and squeeze the trigger, releasing a single shot that zips through the air and right past Alice’s hair, kicking it up a little. It strikes the raving, undead corpse in the rig
ht eye socket and blows its clumpy brains out the back of its mangled, fleshy skull. I was going for right between the eyes, but it’ll do.

  Its arms fall lifeless and it plummets to the ground at Alice’s feet, making a loud thud that finally jolts her back to life. Blood pools out of its skull as she peers down.

  “Come on. Now!” I grab Alice by the hand and forcefully pull her away as the posse of undead break the darkness barrier and step into the light.

  Loud screams and moans chase after us as we run through the barely lit halls, unsure where the hell we’re going.

  3

  It seems like we’re running in circles in some big maze designed to watch rats try and figure out how to get to the cheese. Every one of the corridors looks and smells the same—putrid covered walls and that oh so sweet delicious smell of some walking corpse trying to rip the skin from my body. There are crates and drums of who knows what placed irregularly down the halls. If I had half a second and a wild hair, I may be inclined to see if there is anything of use in them.

  I’ve nearly used a full clip now, but they keep coming out of every nook and cranny. If something doesn’t happen soon, I’ll be the main course and Alice will be dessert.

  “Watch out!” I yell as one of them, more preserved and a hell of a lot faster, comes out of nowhere and steals Alice away from me.

  It tosses her to the ground and is on her like white on rice. She kicks with her arms and legs as it gets on top of her. She screams for me to help her, for me to do something, but I’ve got two more barreling down on us that don’t act interested in talking things out. I have completely lost track of how many shots I have left in the Glock and I’m just waiting to hear that dreaded click, click sound.

  I pop off two rounds without even aiming and nail both of the bastards in the middle of their heads. They drop to the ground like a girl’s dress at prom and I swing the Glock over to cap the other corpse in the head.

  Click, Click!!

  Guess I shouldn’t have jinxed myself.

  I toss the Glock to the side and look around, trying to spot anything that can be used as a weapon. At first, I almost don’t see it hanging nicely in its grimy covered glass box. Joy! I toss my right elbow like a bouncer in a bar and break the glass, shattering it into smaller pieces that litter the floor below. I rip the axe from its resting place and rear back like I’m up to bat.

  The meat-eater is circling her throat, trying to stick its deformed tongue out as if to sample the meal before diving right in. She’s fighting, finally acting like she wants to live. I guess her rollercoaster of emotions is on hold for right now.

  With all her might, Alice gets her hands on the thing’s shoulders and pushes it up, slightly raising the thing’s head up high enough for me to go to work.

  I swing like Barry Bonds and hit the thing right in the side of the neck, lopping its head clean off. It bounces off the wall beside them and takes a tumble down the opposite way. Its now headless body spits up blood like a clogged fountain.

  “Ewwwww,” Alice screams as she tosses the body to the side.

  She launches to her feet and gets behind me, panting hard and grasping my shirt as if her life depends on it. We stand there, our backs literally against the wall as the swarm of undead close in on us from both directions. The axe in my hand is taut and the blade drips with the thicker than normal blood of the thing’s head I just teed off. I’m not sure what my next move is going to be, but the next SOB that gets near us will sure as snot become a little lighter.

  “What are we going to do now?” Alice asks.

  I would love nothing more than to tell her that I have an ingenious plan that I am just waiting to execute, but I’ve never been a great liar, or at least Becky always told me that.

  “I don’t know, but whatever happens, stay close and behind me.” I get back in my batting stance and prepare for a homerun derby.

  A grate above us falls and smacks into the ground right in front of me. The loud ringing sound of the metal grate dancing on the floor nearly stops my heart. I look up and see a bushy haired man, ragged and worn in the face, extending his arm down from the vent running along this corridor. His hair and beard are black as night and the bags under his brown eyes look like they are being pulled down by weights.

  Funny, amidst everything going on around me and it being partially dark down these halls, my eyesight seems to be getting better, sharper even.

  “Give me your hand!” he yells, reaching as far as he can.

  Again, I’m not at that trusting point yet, but with the undead army looking at me with those hungry eyes, I’m willing to give Grizzly Adams a little leeway.

  I drop the axe and swing around, grabbing Alice by the waist and lifting her up, which is surprisingly easy.

  “What about you?” Alice asks.

  “I’ll be right behind you, now get up there,” I tell Alice as the spry man lifts her into the haven of the vent.

  Alice climbs into the metal box above and clears out of view, allowing the bushy haired man to reappear with his arm dangling down like a life line at me. “Come on, give me your . . . Behind you!”

  I spin around and find one of the infected coming at me, its spiked arms swinging in all directions and its teeth clenched tightly. It swings its right, spiked armed and takes a stab at my head, buzzing the top of my scalp as I fall to the ground and roll past it. Before it has a chance to move around and track my oh so succulent scent, I gain position behind it and grab its head. Fluidly, I rip both of my hands in either direction and hear the snap of its neck. It loosely moves around like a bobble head and it falls to the floor.

  I pick the axe back up and dispose of two more in the worst possible way—something like out of a horror flick that is nearly too gruesome to tell or show. I toss the axe end over end and nail another demon in the head. I’m on a roll.

  Feeling somewhat elated and energized, I grab one of the barrels near me and quickly work it over to the vent opening. More of the undead shuffle closer from all directions.

  Screw it, I’m close enough. I climb on top of the solid drum. The bushy haired man is still waiting for me. One giant leap up and forward and I snag the man’s hand, dangling like a worm over a pond of hungry catfish. The rejected souls from hell’s gate converge under me and reach into the air, trying to grab my low-hanging feet.

  I’m not the skinniest man around and I wonder if this battered man will have the strength to lift me out of the fire, especially since he just lifted up Alice.

  “Don’t worry, brother, I got ya,” he says as he struggles to drag me in.

  I take a moment to catch my breath and center my thoughts from the chaotic spectacle below. A loud thud rocks the vent. Lying on my stomach with my feet near the opening, I peer back over my shoulder and see a deformed head look inside. One of its eyes has been ripped out and its mouth is a hell of a lot larger and sharper than anything I have yet to encounter. Its skin looks like leather and the smell is atrocious. No two man-eaters seem to have the same scent.

  It lets out an ear piercing shrill that sends everyone’s hands over their ears, distorting our senses.

  It grabs my left ankle and tugs hard. I slide back towards the opening. This thing is strong and it doesn’t seem like he’s going to take no for an answer. I can hear the other man-eaters below clamoring in hopes that something meaty and delicious falls to their feet.

  I lift my right leg up as far as I can and shove my thick-soled boot hard into its face, thinking for sure it will get the hint and let go. Its head snaps back, but its hands remain tightly gripped on my left ankle.

  “You’ve pissed it off good now,” the bushy haired man says as he pulls a 9mm Beretta from behind his back and takes aim at the unyielding beast.

  I cover my ears with my hands as he chambers off a single round, creating an echo inside that tin can that almost splits my ear drums in two.

  Its Kung Fu grip instantly releases my ankle and the vent shim
mies a bit as the corpse falls to the masses below. I lift my hands off my ears and raise my head as he places the Beretta behind him.

  “Come on, let’s go,” he says. His voice sounds like it’s muffled or something. Probably the ringing from the gunshot that is tickling both my ears.

  I nod my head at him, watching as he backs up through the vent and disappears around a corner. Funny enough, through the buzzing sound clogging my head, I can still hear the infected below, moaning and groaning. Right now, I’m just happy we’re up here and not down there.

  I leave the flesh-eaters to pine for us and snake my way through the vent. It’s not quiet by any means, crackling and popping as I crawl through. I guess Alice and the bushy haired man have already made it to wherever it is I’m going.

  4

  After a good jaunt in the metal maze high above Death Valley, I come to the end and see the bushy haired man exiting the vent and dropping out of sight. I’m still leery of anyone I meet, but I’ll take my chances right now with someone who doesn’t act like they want to use me as a chew toy.

  I get to the end of the vent and peer out into the space below, finding Alice among a few other women and a handful of guys pacing the semi large room with guns resting on their shoulders. Looks inviting enough I guess.

  I turn myself around and drop out of the vent, my boots hitting the grayish concrete floor. I would have figured they knew I was coming, but their startled reaction and their weapons training on my skull say otherwise.

  “Don’t move or I’ll put two right in the side of your head before you can even think of objecting to it,” a man says as I feel the barrel of his gun press firmly against my skin. I can’t see his face, but the raspy tone of his voice and the smell of the garbage heap he calls a mouth give me some indication what I’m dealing with.