The Zombie Virus (Book 1) (30 page)

“It’s locked.” Her shoulders slumped as the
last of her energy reserves drained away.

Down by the road more Loonies were turning
the corner and running up the driveway, their feet crunching loudly
in the gravel.

I took Kera by the hand and ran along the
porch that hugged the entire front of the old house. We jumped off
the end and turned the corner looking for another entry point into
the structure. Kera was stumbling behind me like an automaton and I
had to nearly drag her along.

A set of slanted doors were sticking out of
the ground for a storm cellar that led under the house. The slatted
wood doors were painted a faded blue with large rusted hinges
holding them to the old cinderblock frame. An old metal latch was
across the doors with a brass padlock through it, luckily the
padlock wasn’t closed.

I reached down and unlatched the twin doors
and threw one of them wide open, revealing worn concrete steps
leading down into the darkness of the cellar. I shoved Kera down
into the hole as I glanced over my shoulder at the Loonies pouring
around the house and off the front porch. I hurriedly followed her
down, slamming down the heavy wooden door behind me.

I was engulfed in the cool, impenetrable
blackness of the subterranean room. I could see nothing except for
a tiny shaft of light that pierced through the edge of the doors
like a flashlight beam illuminating the stairway.

A loud thump reverberated off of the wooden
doors when the first of the Loonies reached it. In seconds multiple
fists were pounding and scratching at its surface. Dust stirred
thickly from its slats, dancing in the narrow beam of light which
quickly faded out as bodies crowded against the outside of the
door.

I reached into my pocket and pulled out the
headlamp and switched it on. Kera sat near me at the bottom of the
steps, her back against the wall and her head hung forward in
exhaustion.

The drumming on the door was unnerving, I
wasn’t sure if the old wooden doors would hold up long to this
unending assault. I spotted a long, thick piece of oak against the
wall beside me, and realizing immediately what it was for. I sat
the rifle down, grabbed the plank, and ran back up the steps with
it. A thick, angled piece of iron was attached to the bottom center
of each door. I shoved the plank through them, effectively locking
the opposing doors closed. It would help, but it did not make them
impenetrable.

Back down in the cellar I assessed our
situation. We were safe momentarily, although it wouldn’t take
those things long to find a way in. I’m not sure how many were out
there, or even if we had enough ammo between us to fight them all
off.

“Please God make them stop!” Kera whispered.
The beating on the door was nerve-rattling in the confined space of
the cellar.

I shined my light around. Shelves lined one
wall, stocked with various canning jars filled with a variety of
vegetables, sauces and meats. At least we wouldn’t starve down
here. Junk and old furniture lay jumbled about the musty room,
along with a large workbench lined with antique tools and jars of
nails, screws and various other items. Cobwebs hung heavily in the
corners and from the ceiling. Off to a side, an old wooden
staircase led up to a door on what would be the first floor of the
farmhouse. In the center of the room, attached to one of the thick
wooden trusses for the main floor, was a light-fixture with a dingy
white bulb stuck in it and a thin chain hanging down its side.

I stepped over and pulled the chain
hopefully. The switch clicked overhead, but no light sprang from
the bulb. The grid was down here also.

Suddenly I heard a sharp squeaking sound over
my head. It was a brief noise, like someone had shifted their
weight on the old wooden floor of the farmhouse. I stopped moving
and tried to listen over the din of the growling, snarling, and
banging of the Loonies for the noise to repeat itself. Could it
have been the house settling or had one of those things made entry
into the house? I was sure I would have heard a Loony breaching a
door or window above me.

Fatigue clouded my mind. Maybe I had imagined
the noise. The ruckus from the creatures at the outside cellar
doors made hearing anything difficult with the chaotic echoes
rebounding off of the cut stone walls.

“We should go upstairs and look around.”

I wasn’t sure if Kera had heard me. The bill
of her cap hid her face from my view when I shined the light on
her. She slowly stood up. I felt sorry for her. I know she was
exhausted and still in pain from her beating yesterday, plus the
hit she had taken earlier from the Frank Loony.

She stoically walked over to me and threw me
a forced smile. “Let’s do it.”

I grabbed her hand and led her over to the
staircase that climbed sharply upward to a flimsy white wooden
door. I hoped it was unlocked, however, I felt sure that if it
wasn’t I would be able to shoulder it open without too much
effort.

We climbed the thick wooden stairs, each step
eliciting a loud squeak from the well-worn wood. I reached out and
turned the tarnished brash knob and the door unlatched and swung
silently open, revealing the dimly lit interior of a small,
cluttered kitchen. Dishes were piled high in a drainer next to the
sink and an ornate teapot sat silent on an old gas stove. The
remains of a meal were laid out across a wooden missionary style
table that had two long butt-polished benches for seats.

The meal could have just recently been
abandoned by the look of it. Two plates sat on the table, with
partially eaten rice, corn kernels, and what looked like chicken
mixed in with it. Two empty glasses with milk film still visible
within them sat next to the plates.

My spidey-sense was tingling again.

I stepped out of the cellar opening, allowing
Kera room to come up beside me and quietly closed the door behind
me, drowning out a good portion of the racket caused by the raging
Loonies.

I turned to Kera and put my finger to my
lips.

The food didn’t look old and there was no
sign of insect infestation or rot. I stepped over to the table and
touched the rice-meat mixture. It was still warm.

I brought Holly’s rifle up to ready and
pointed around the corner of the kitchen wall to where it opened to
another section of the house, where I think the noise had emanated
from when we were in the cellar. Kera un-slung her shotgun, her
eyes alert and ready.

I lightly stepped across the linoleum floor
toward the next room, which was in the front portion of the old
farmhouse. I stepped around the corner of the yellowing walls into
a fairly large living room. My headlamp reflected off the face of
an old tube-type television which sat silently and dark against a
wall with peeling blue wall paper. Curtains and shades were drawn
across the framed windows that looked out onto the porch, keeping
the room engulfed in a gloomy darkness. Old throw-covered furniture
sat arranged around the room with an antique wooden rocker placed
strategically before the antiquated TV.

My light scanned across the well-used sofa. A
muffled scream pushed past my lips and my finger tightened on the
rifle’s trigger when I illuminated two human figures sitting
silently and still, huddled together and very much alive. The light
reflected off of the whites of their eyes and I immediately
released pressure on the trigger, my hand flew back against Kera’s
chest to stop her from shooting.

“You two are tresspassin’,” a voice like
gravel in a tin can sprang out of the white haired figure of a
tough, wiry-framed, bulbous-nosed old man that was sitting next to
what I assumed was his equally old wife. Their faces were deeply
lined with the wrinkled crevasses of people who spent most of their
lives working hard outdoors. A double-barreled shotgun was leveled
steadily at my chest.

I let the rifle drop to my side and raised my
hands to show that I had nothing in them. The couple squinted at me
and I realized that I was blinding them with my headlamp.

“Sorry,” I apologized, removing the band from
my head and aiming the light at the floor between us.

The shotgun stayed centered on my chest.

“You two brought them things here,” the
gravelly voice accused.

Kera was standing next to me with her shotgun
leveled at the couple.

“I’m sorry,” I repeated, using my hand to
force Kera to lower the shotgun. “We meant you no harm. I didn’t
think anyone would still be alive here.”

The incessant banging and screeching coming
from the Loonies outside continued unabated.

“This is our home,” the gray haired lady said
in a soft but husky voice that did not fit her old frail frame.
“You are not welcome here.” Her hands were in her lap, folded in
the crease of the faded floral-print dress that she wore.

“Do you two know what’s happening out there?”
Kera spoke up, anger rising in her voice. I put my hand on her
shoulder to calm her down.

“We know that things have gone to Hell in a
hand-basket and people have gone as crazy as a bag full of
ferrets,” the old man croaked. Still his shotgun never wavered from
its aim. “Now, y’all need to get out of here and take them things
with you!” he ordered, emphasizing the direction we should go with
the barrel of the gun.

“Are you two stupid?” Kera snorted and raised
her shotgun back up. “How about we—”

“Kera, please! Let me handle this!” I hissed,
pushing the barrel of her gun back down. I didn’t need her losing
her cool with those two exceptionally large-bore holes pointed at
my chest.

“I’m sorry we led those things here to your
home. If we had known someone was living here we wouldn’t have
come.” I put as much sincerity as I could muster behind each
word.

The old man guffawed.

“This is a house, why wouldn’t there be
people living here?” the woman asked rhetorically.

“Because most people are now dead or insane.
There are damn few survivors and we should all be happy that we
have found each other!” I felt my anger rising also. Were these
people really this naïve?

“But why did y’all have to bring them here?”
the woman asked, her face tight with fear.

“We’re sorry, but what’s done is done.” My
voice took on a harsher tone, the ‘stern papa tone’, as Holly used
to call it. “My friend Kera and I are not going anywhere for the
moment. There are too many of those things out there. Now you can
shoot me if you want, but I can guarantee you that when you do Kera
will shoot the both of you dead before you can blink an eye and if
you somehow do miraculously kill us both, then you two will be
alone to deal with that horde of monsters that are for the moment
outside your house!”

As if to confirm my prediction, several
shadows flitted past the shaded light filtering in through the
windows and something banged hard against the front door.

The old couple nearly jumped out their skin
and for the first time since entering the room the shotgun moved
off my chest and swung toward the door.

I lunged forward and grabbed the cold barrel
of the gun and roughly yanked it from the old man’s bony, wrinkly
hands.

“Hey!” he whined, his eyes round with shock.
“That’s mine!”

“Yeah, well when you learn to be a little
more hospitable to guests you can have it back,” I said in a raised
whisper, aware that more Loonies were piling onto the porch.

I opened the shotgun’s breech and removed the
two plastic-cased shells. Double-ought buckshot, that would have
ruined my day. After pocketing the two shells, I set the gun
against the wall and turned back to the old couple.

Kera stood covering the couple, who had their
arms around each other now. I felt sorry for them. I know that we
had brought trouble into their isolated lives.

The front door rattled violently when someone
pulled on the handle trying to force it open. The man and woman
both gasped in fright. I held my finger to my lips to silence
them.

After a moment the Loony released the door
handle. I could hear multiple footsteps on the porch above the
racket from the storm cellar doors.

“Are we ready to treat each other a little
more amiably?” I asked the couple in a low voice.

They looked up at me with silent, angry
stares.

I let out a resigned sigh. “Suit yourselves,
but our chances are much better if we work together against those
creatures trying to get in here and kill us.”

“What are we going to do with them, Steve?”
Kera asked.

The old lady let out a gasp. “You’re Steven?
Steven McQuinn?” she asked excitedly.

I was momentarily speechless. How in the hell
did she know me?

“Your boy!” she said, getting to her feet
over the protestations of her husband. “Your boy stayed with us
last night! He said his ma and pa would be looking for him.” She
was smiling broadly, revealing a fine set of straight, white
teeth.

I felt the strength go out of my knees and if
it wasn’t for Kera putting her arm around my waist I would have
sank to the floor.

“Jeremy,” his name tore from my lips. “You’ve
seen my son?”

“He came by late last night. He was real
frightened. Said he was drawn to our candlelight through the
window. We got some vittles into him and bedded him down for the
night. He fell right asleep after he filled his belly up.”

She came up to me and put her hands on my
arms, looking closely at my face, then Kera’s.

“Said his pa’s name was Steven and his ma’s
Holly. Didn’t say nothin’ bout no young girl. You his sister?” she
asked.

Kera shook her head.

“Didn’t think so.” The old woman gave me a
stern look. “What happened to yur face honey? Looks like it’s been
through the wringer.” She softly touched the bruises and bandaged
cuts covering Kera’s face.