Authors: Peter Cawdron
“Wasn’t us,” I say, panting for breath.
“Talk to me Haze.”
It’s Steve. It’s so good to hear his voice.
“I’m hot. So hot,” I say, feeling delirious.
Lightheaded and giddy, I stumble forward, trying not to fall. I need to get a better look at the warehouse.
“Doyle,” Elizabeth says. “She’s overheating. Telemetry is reading one twenty inside her suit. You have got to get her out of there.”
“I’m standing in the loading dock,” Doyle says. “The tablets. They’re here. They’re right here.”
“Get her out of there!”
Doyle kicks at the pet supplies scattered across the floor with his thick boots, asking me, “Do you see them?”
“No,” I say, feeling sick.
The warehouse swirls around me, which is confusing. It should be still. I catch a glimpse of the stairs, the upper office, the solid steel door leading to the kennels, and a spaceman standing in the aisle as I spin, crumpling to the floor. My helmet collects with the polished concrete floor. There’s a sickening crack and my head lashes back.
“Doyle? Hazel? What’s happening? We do not have eyes. I repeat. No eyes. You are in dead ground. You are off screen.”
“Hazel is down,” Doyle replies.
I vomit.
Sick sprays across the inside of my helmet. The smell is nauseating, and I throw up again. Chunks of partially digested beans drip from the cracked glass. My throat is on fire.
“We’ve lost telemetry.”
“I’ve got her,” Doyle says, rolling me on my side. Warm, sticky vomit runs down my cheek. I struggle to stay conscious. My eyes flicker. Darkness threatens.
“Can’t breathe,” I say, choking on my words.
“Hazel,” Doyle says. “Listen to me. Stay with me. You’re going to be okay.”
“Can’t,” is all I can manage, unable to complete even a simple sentence.
“Sit Rep,” Ajeet says. Somewhere in the background I can hear Steve panicking. I want to tell him I’m okay, but I’m not. In my delirious state, I’m more worried about him than myself. I don’t want him to panic. I’ll be fine. I try to say those words, but nothing comes out of my mouth other than bile.
Doyle hoists me onto some kind of flat cart.
“Sit Rep,” Ajeet repeats, and I’m vaguely aware of how difficult and frustrating it must be for those back at base. They can’t see us. They can’t hear much other than Doyle grunting as he drags me onto the cart, while I continue to gagging and vomiting inside my suit. I convulse and begin dry retching. My arms shake.
“Heat stroke,” Doyle says. “She’s overheating.”
“Can’t breathe,” I say, trying to open my helmet. I manage to get the golden outer visor up. The sun is bright, much brighter than I thought. With the visor down, the day looked overcast, but it’s actually quite beautiful. Not a cloud in the sky. As bad as I feel, I’ll cling to any crazy thought bouncing around in my head. “Nice day. Can’t... breathe...”
Doyle races down the alley, pushing me along on the cart, but there’s no suspension. I can’t help but bounce and fall to one side, sliding off the side of the cart in a heap. My helmet scrapes along the concrete and all I can think of is how I’m damaging a suit worth hundreds of thousands of dollars. Elizabeth is going to be mad.
“Shit,” Doyle says, grabbing at my shoulders and trying to haul me back onto the cart, but my body is limp. The unidirectional wheels allow the cart to roll away as he tries to wrestle my body back onto the flat deck. He grabs at the handle, wedging the cart against the wall.
“Hazel. Hazel. Stay with me.”
“Need air,” I say, fiddling with the locking ring on my helmet visor.
“No,” Doyle says, batting my hand away. He tries to close the golden outer visor, but he’s in such a rush it only closes halfway. I’m desperate. I feel like I’m drowning. I’m trapped under water, hundreds of feet from the surface. My lungs are burning, bursting. I have to breathe.
A catch releases beneath my gloved fingers and the inner, clear glass visor unlocks. I push both visors up. Cool air rushes in. Vomit drips from the steel locking ring.
Finally, I can breathe.
In the distance, zombies turn, already smelling my sickly sweet scent on the breeze.
Doyle doesn’t see them.
I point at them. I try to say something as he turns me around, struggling with both my suit and the cart, but instead I vomit over his waist and legs.
Doyle has both hands beneath my armpits, dragging me back onto the cart. He lets go and my body sinks onto the flat wooden deck, but my legs are still dragging on the ground.
“What’s happening out there?” Elizabeth asks.
Doyle doesn’t respond. He’s breathing a hard into his microphone.
Elizabeth says, “You’ve got company.”
“What?” he replies. Although I can’t see his face behind his golden visor, I can see him leaning over me. He finally sees my open visor. He lets go of me and I slump to the concrete.
“Shit,” he says, looking around and realizing my suit is no longer sealed. It’s only then he notices that I threw up on him.
Zombies appear from nowhere, stepping out of the shadows.
“You need to get out of there now!” Elizabeth cries. “I’m seeing activity up to a quarter mile. They’re coming, and they’re coming fast.”
“No gun,” Doyle mumbles.
“What?”
He turns, looking back into the warehouse.
“Dropped it when she fell. Can’t see it.”
“There’s a spare in the Tesla,” Elizabeth says calmly, but it seems she can’t maintain her composure as she then repeats herself, crying out, “You need to get the hell out of there!”
I have my helmet off. There’s no sense in wearing it any more, and it feels liberating to be free of the claustrophobic shell around my head.
“Hazel? Can you hear me?”
“Yes,” I say, responding to Elizabeth.
“Get back to the Tesla. Do you understand me? Get back to the car.”
“Yes.”
Without my helmet, I have a much better view of my suit. I pull on the straps holding the backpack in place, releasing clips on either side of my waist, but I can’t undo the hoses leading into the life-support unit or the straps over my shoulders.
Twisting at the locking rings on my wrists, I manage to get my gloves off. With my hands free, I can unscrew the hoses, but the pack still weighs me down. I need someone to help me disconnect.
“I’m up,” I say, struggling to my feet and leaning against the brick wall, but there’s no response. By disconnecting the wiring, I’ve cut my lifeline with the others.
Where’s Doyle?
Doyle is on the move. He runs across the road in his spacesuit. Dozens of zombies chase after him. He’s not going to make it. The suit is slowing him down. He gets to within a few feet of the Tesla before he disappears beneath the ravenous horde. Was it his motion that attracted them? Was it the smell of vomit? Was he a coward abandoning me? Or was he going for the gun? Either way, it doesn’t matter. In my mind, he’s a hero. He tried. And he distracted Zee long enough for me to get to my feet.
A lone zombie snarls at me from the end of the alley. He staggers toward me, slowly increasing his speed to a jog, then a run, and finally a sprint.
I’m in a dead end.
There’s nowhere to run.
My legs are shaking.
Chapter 13: Checkmate
The loading dock serves both the warehouse at the back of the vet clinic and an office block. I run for the tower, knowing it’s a mistake, already hearing David’s warning about not going to ground and hiding, but I’m out of options. My life is measured in seconds, not days or years. Mere seconds. Each thumping beat of my heart could be my last as zombies crowd around me, reaching for me with withered hands. Ducking and weaving, I run for the building, struggling under the weight of the life-support system.
More zombies amble up a ramp from the darkened parking garage beneath the building.
Weapon. I need a weapon.
I’m hurt. I’m alone. I’m tired. But I’m thinking straight. I understand what needs to be done, but my body is in no shape for a fight. Even without the helmet, the suit is bulky and heavy. The backpack is like an anchor dragging around behind me.
Thoughts flicker across my mind as I grasp for solutions. I’m a drowning man clutching at the surface, gasping for breath, unable to break through the waves. A couple of days ago, I dropped a gun in the warehouse. No, that was a box of bullets. They scattered across the concrete floor. Steve and I took the guns with us. Damn. Nathan—my baseball bat. It’s in the office upstairs, but it’s broken. There’s no time. I need more time.
A zombie lunges at me. Instinctively, I hold my arm up to shield my face. Zee bites at the white sleeve of the spacesuit. The fabric is thick and stiff, unyielding to the zombie’s teeth, allowing me the opportunity to shift my weight and send the zombie careering to one side.
More zombies converge on me. The smell must have brought them running. They’re salivating like Pavlov’s dogs, already anticipating the taste of my flesh.
I trip, toppling over with the weight of the backpack and crash to the ground.
A teenaged girl roughly my age snarls with delight. She drops onto me. Her teeth sink into my stomach and I scream, but the suit frustrates her efforts. She can’t understand why she can’t bite me and repeatedly tries to tear the suit material away, wanting to disembowel me. I strike at her head with the steel rings on the cuff of my spacesuit, knocking her away, but another zombie grabs my forearm, again trying to bite through the suit.
Several other zombies pile on top of me, biting each other. Snarling and howling, they tear chunks from each other like sharks. There’s blood in the water. It’s a mindless feeding frenzy. Zombies tear at my suit with their sharp, spindly fingers, trying to rip open the thick material.
I shuffle with my feet, kicking off the ground with my thick boots as the zombies writhing over me attack each other. Rolling to one side, I wriggle free from beneath Zee.
A frail elderly man kneels beside me. Fresh blood drips from his mouth. His eyes lock with mine and he lunges for my neck as his head explodes. Brain matter splatters across the concrete inches from me, causing me to flinch in revulsion.
Doyle?
Another gunshot rings out, echoing between the buildings, and another zombie crumples, collapsing on top of me. Blood and brains ooze out of the back of his head in shades of scarlet. Rivers of dark crimsons stain the right leg of my white spacesuit. I bat at his body, rolling away from him and onto all fours. Grabbing onto a drainpipe on the side of the warehouse, I pull myself to my feet. My backpack swings wildly, half detached from my shoulders, making it difficult to move.
Another shot clips the shoulder of a thin woman grabbing at the steel collar on my suit and her hand breaks away, shaking in violent spasms. She looks at me as if I somehow did this, and then the right side of her face explodes as another shot finds its target.
Zee is confused. Each echo causes Zee to turn, trying to locate the shooter.
Another deafening boom resounds through the air and another head lashes backwards. Blood splatters across the brick wall.
I scramble backwards, pushing off the wall and getting clear of Zee.
“Up here,” a voice cries.
David?
DAVID.
“Quick!”
David kneels on the roof above the entrance to the office building. He has his hand outstretched. I run and jump, grabbing at his wrist. He drops his gun in the gutter lining the roof and yanks at my arm, dragging me onto the corrugated steel awning. Zombies snatch at my life-support pack, dragging me backwards, but David will not be deterred. He clutches at the steel collar of my spacesuit and hauls me onto the roof with a burst of raw energy and emotion, screaming as he falls backwards. I collapse on top of him.
Zombies grab at the edge of the roof, but it’s too late. We’re too high. I roll away from them, still trying to shake the torn backpack loose.
“Hazel,” he says. “What the hell? How did you get here?”
I’m breathing so hard my lungs are burning. It takes a second before I can reply.
“You?” I gasp. “Was going to ask you… Same question.”
David picks up his gun and tucks it into the small of his back, ignoring the horde swelling beneath us. Hundreds of arms reach for us, longing for us, calling after us.
He helps me to my feet, saying, “In here.”
I crawl onto the second floor through a broken window, grabbing awkwardly at the life-support pack and finally freeing it from my shoulder. The backpack falls to the floor, relieving me of easily seventy pounds. I feel as though I’m going to float away.
“What were you doing out there?” David asks, but I can’t answer. Jane is lying on the rotten carpet. She has a blanket draped over her and a bundle of rags rolled up as a pillow.
“Jane!” I cry, scrambling over to her. Lifeless eyes stare at me without a hint of recognition. Sweat beads on her forehead.
“What happened?” I ask.
“She was bitten,” David replies, running his hands up through his short hair, clearly distressed. “I didn’t know what else to do. I came here hoping I could cure her. I’ve given her your tablets, but they don’t work.”
A box of tablets lies on the floor beside her. Two packets have been torn open.
“They worked,” I say with a level of confidence I shouldn’t have. I don’t know that for sure, but she hasn’t turned.
Yet.
I continue, saying, “I think she’s got an infection. We need to get her to the base.”
“Whoa there,” David says, gesturing to my bloodied bulky spacesuit. “What base? What the hell are you wearing?”
“There are survivors,” I say unable suppress my excitement. “Scientists. They’re at the old Marshall Space Flight Center.”
I point across the intersection, but there’s nothing there. The Tesla is gone. A cracked helmet with a shattered golden visor lies on the road, but there’s no blood. Doyle got away.
“Survivors?”
“Yes, but not just survivors. They’ve got stuff. Things from before. All the things we left behind. Running water. Electricity. Toilet paper!”
Toilet paper seemed like a good thing to say until those two words slipped out of my mouth. Now, toilet paper sounds kinda silly.