Dead Quarantine (8 page)

She sat on the ground a foot from him,
staring at the horror going on below. A line of buses snaked
through the landscape and disappeared behind the horizon. Buses
were rocking violently as if people were fighting in them, and from
what Ralph had seen, that would almost be a certainty. Soldiers
were shooting at the bus that had stood next in line to be sent
into the pit. People poured out of the door and some crawled out of
the windows. They were all shot. All along the line, people started
leaving the buses in a panic, chased by the dead. There were not
enough soldiers to stop everybody; eventually they would get
overwhelmed, and by that time, he and Lauryn would be long
gone.

“Oh, God,” Lauryn said. “I'm going to turn
into one of them.”

She sobbed where she sat. He wanted to hug
her, cradle her, sooth her pain, but they could not stay there.
Soon the soldiers or the zombies would notice them. There, he had
said it. The one thing he had been denying, but it was
unmistakable. Dead bodies walking were just that. He was not clear
how it happened or how it worked. It must have been caused by the
flu; it couldn't be anything else unless it never was the flu to
begin with.

“We need to go.”

She pushed him away and resisted him pulling
her back up, but the flu had weakened her. She soon gave up
fighting.

“Please leave me; it hurts all over.”

He held her tightly, arms slung around each
other. They walked like they had just returned from a night
partying. Instead of going down the hill, he led her around the
wall surrounding the pit. They would never survive if they tried
going right through the line with buses and the onslaught going on
there. They trudged on; each step brought them farther out of sight
and increased their chances of escape.

Out of sight, he started looking for a place
where they could descend easily. By the time he found an easy
slope, Lauryn was breathing heavily. She had kept silent, but now
she whispered in his ear, “Put me down, please.”

He didn't want to. He knew what would happen
if he did and he just couldn't face it right now. He went down the
slope, dragging her with him. He saw a ditch a hundred feet away.
They struggled over to it, and he sat her down and dropped next to
her. The adrenaline rush left his body and he felt the strain of
the day now. Pain, hurt, fatigued, and many more uncomfortable
feelings. Him being the healthy one, it must have been ten times
worse for Lauryn. The realization of what had happened hit him
hard, amplified by the screams faintly ahead and the shots ringing
in the air.

She was crying; he wanted to cry. Was this
happening all over the world? What about mom and Ginny? Did
everyone turn or only those the flu killed? Could someone be cured?
He grabbed and pulled Lauryn to him and hugged her tightly. The
question that he didn't want to ask, but had to answer, was: What
about her?

She sobbed, her head buried against his
chest. “It's going to happen to me and you know it.”

He knew all right. “Doesn’t need to be
so.”

“Stop it. I will not be the death of you.
You'll leave me here, you hear.”

He shook his head, holding his tears in. He
didn't want to look at her. He knew if he did, he would see the
fever in her eyes, her runny nose, and her pale skin. Admitting it
made it final.

She grabbed his head with both hands and
pulled him to her with a strength he thought had left her long ago.
He felt her lips on his. A fevered tongue press inside. He let go
for a moment, then pulled back. Her face was glowing, her eyes
dilated, her smile lovely but weak.

“You need to go. I'll be all right.”

He nodded. He looked around and saw a sheet
of plywood a distance away. He nabbed it and took it with him. If
he went away, he would not leave her without some sort of shelter.
His heart ached at the thought of leaving her behind, but the
thought of what would happen when she turned, what he might have to
do to her, was much worse. He fought his tears and put on a brave
face. He tried to say something but choked up. Ralph breathed
deeply.

“I'll cover you up. Stay in there and hide
from anyone.”

He kissed her good-bye. She grabbed his hand
before he turned away.

“Ralph, I think I...am happy we became
friends...survive this.”

“You hang in there; I'll come back for
you.”

She let go of him and closed her eyes. He
withstood the urge to feel for a pulse. It was for the best he
didn't know, to remember her in life instead of in death. He tore
from her side and ran. He kept running and cursed himself for
giving her hope by saying he would come back while he was not even
sure he would.

CHAPTER SEVEN

Ralph
ran up a hill. Drawing shallow breaths, his lungs were about to
give out. He dropped on his knees and stretched out on his back. In
the distance, he saw the wall surrounding the pit and the heat
still emanating at its top, painting the darkening sky red. Soon it
would be pitch black and he hoped the zombies could see worse than
him. From this side, he could not see the buses or any movement.
The shots fired had stopped a while ago. The last of the soldiers
was dead by now; they had been eaten or joined the ranks of the
walking dead. There was no way they could have fended off the
multitude of zombies.

Ralph scanned the base of the walled pit for
any sign of Lauryn. He was afraid he would see her shambling
around, turned into one of these grotesqueries. He touched his
lips. The sensation of kissing her lingered and so had the taste of
sickness. It was not fair. He finally spotted the plywood he had
used to cover her up. No movement. No sign of her. She probably had
passed out; he hoped against all hope that she just slept,
recovering from this infection.

Far off, he heard the whop of rotors. Two
specks appeared on the horizon. They came in fast and low, stopping
a distance from where the buses were parked. They hovered for a
short while and then a stream of fire left them. Missiles propelled
forward and rained destruction on the ground. The explosion flashed
the sky. More whops sounded and more gunships joined the two,
unleashing their rockets. They went up the line, destroying
everything. The boom of the explosions hurt his ears. He could only
think about how Lauryn must be suffering now. He was glad the
attack helicopters focused their fire on moving targets and that
the wall of the pit functioned like a barrier against shrapnel. She
would survive this; however, her head will be ringing for days. He
gritted his teeth. That was if she was still alive.

He stood up, ignoring his screaming muscles,
and continued on. He needed to get far away from the destruction
and find a way home. Going up seemed to be the most logical choice.
He hoped he could make it before darkness set, so that there was
still light for him to see a road or a town, or any place where he
could seek shelter. If he found nothing, he might have to sleep in
the open.

The explosion of rocket fire kept on in the
distance as time passed. The sun kissed the horizon. The sky above
the pit glowed. A line of burning patches snaked the landscape, and
beyond that, light flashed with each explosion. He could only guess
how long that line went on for. So many people had been lined up to
be destroyed. The living and dead together. In a vain attempt to
save the world.

He was on top of the hill. It had taken more
time than he expected it to. Fatigue, and the many loose stones,
made for a slow climb. Here, he had barely enough light left to
see. The land stretched far out; the vegetation was sparse, more
sand and rocks than green. There was only one road visible and that
was the one they took to come here. If he ever wanted to return
home, he had to go back the same way. He knew they had passed a
couple of villages on their way, but right now it was impossible to
go that way and they were tens of miles away. The helicopters were
circling the road, clearing it of anything moving. Besides, it
would be dark soon. He looked in the opposite direction. Far away
he saw a few lights. A small town maybe. He couldn't see that
far.

He had no time to waste. The little light he
had left, he needed for the descent. Without it, it would be too
treacherous to go down and he would have to spend the night on top
of the hill. He had seen no shelter here. He really didn’t have a
choice. He started the climb down. After a few near falls—a misstep
that could have possible sprained his ankle, but luckily didn't—the
last part of the descent he ran, small rocks rolling after him. He
made it down just as the last rays of light shot in the air and
darkness draped the land. It amazed him how quickly he got down
compared to the ascent.

The moon was covered by clouds. The only
light he had to go by was the glow of the fire in the pit, but even
that was subduing with no more fuel being added. He walked in the
direction he thought the town was. At ground level, he couldn't see
its light. It left him guessing if he was going in the right
direction. It was not the first time he had been alone. Since he
got his driver’s license at sixteen, he had been driving around by
himself. He was not into partying, so his parents never worried he
would do something they deemed dangerous, and they allowed him to
stay out late. He would go to the movies with Tom or eat
out—nothing fancy or exciting like running from zombies in the
middle of nowhere. Sometimes he would just drive just to drive. Too
bad his car broke down and he didn't have the money to fix it. His
dad didn't want to loan him the money and instead, he had urged him
to get a job.

The thing was that being alone didn't feel
strange to him, though being out here in the middle of nowhere was.
The expanse around him looked the same wherever he turned. Only the
hill and pit served as known landmarks. No roads. No phone or
electricity cables running above him. It was just a barren
landscape with shrubs here and there. As time passed and the clouds
became darker, he saw less and less of that landscape.

He had been walking for awhile and had
covered some distance. Behind him, the glow of the fires was almost
gone. He didn't know exactly how long he had walked. The battery of
his smart phone had died on him and he had no wristwatch. It felt
like hours, but could have easily just been one. Darkness had the
world in a stranglehold. There was no moon or stars in the sky,
leaving little light for him to see. He slowed down. For all he
knew, he had been walking in circles. No, not circles. He had taken
care in keeping the pit to his back, but he could have walked the
wrong way and be miles away from the lights he had seen from the
hill.

He stepped on something hard instead of the
dirt and foliage he been walking on. He knelt down and felt with
his hand. The road. He had stumbled upon it. To his left would lead
back to where he came. He couldn't go there. He turned right.
Walking on the road at night could be dangerous, but he was sure
that today there would be no cars coming. Soldiers must have made
it clear someway or another that the road was closed. He walked for
about another hour when he got a definite answer to that. The road
was blocked with traffic fences and a sign that the road was
closed.

Far away, he saw lights shining. Ralph ran
toward the town, laughing and whooping as he went. He would finally
see people again. Get help. Call home and check on his mom and
Ginny. There had to be someone willing to help him. Maybe someone
would lend him a car. What if they were dead and walking? He
stopped running and hollering. Staring at the lights, now much
closer, it didn't feel so inviting anymore.

No movements, sound, anything. He could see
shades of buildings. The streetlights cast eerie shadows over the
walls of the houses. He walked closer, keeping to the side of the
road in an effort not to stick out. If he had to flee, he could
bolt into the darkness of the wilderness surrounding the small town
and hope that the zombies were not the fast-moving kind or that
they could see in the dark.

The lights inside the houses were off. Was
the town also quarantined? Its inhabitants could have been the
first to go down after the pit. He got closer and saw there was in
fact one house with its lights on. The town consisted of a few
hundred houses, he guessed. The row of buildings was split by the
road that coursed through the town. He hugged the wall of the first
house. It had no fence or garden. He crept along it toward the
closest window. He peeked inside. With the little streetlight
coming in, he saw an empty room with walls that still needed
plastering. The houses were recently finished. He walked around the
corner. A for sale sign was stuck in front of the house. In fact,
they were in front of all the houses, but the one with its lights
on. He was in a new subdivision, recently finished. It wasn't a
town; it had more of a gated community feel to it, but on a smaller
scale, or it must be a small project in a larger one. Either way,
the inhabitants were one family; plus one if you counted him.

There was only one family he could ask help
from. If they turned him down, he would have to seek it somewhere
else, and there might not be a somewhere else—not anymore. The good
thing was that he didn't have to worry about zombies. This family
would have been secluded from the infected, living in such a remote
location. He sighed in relief and followed the road to the house.
It couldn't be more than two hundred yards to the house, a small
distance compared to what he must have walked already.

The houses on each side of him stood in
darkness like empty husks waiting to be filled. But with how the
world was falling apart, they would likely stand dormant for some
time. He passed a house still under construction, one of five all
neatly rowed next to each other that formed a nice block. The last
houses waited to be finished. A construction van was parked next to
it. The windows had to be put in and the walls painted; the job was
almost done. It was a perfect place to seek shelter if the need
arose. He would not have to break in; he could just get in one of
the open windows. Maybe even through the door. How likely would it
be locked anyway? He was tempted to check, but thought better of
it.