Degeneration (33 page)

FEMA Evacuation Bus Guidelines

Keep your mask on at all times.
No talking.

Do not touch other passengers. D
o not approach the driver.

Obey all orders from military staff.

As Richard scanned the inside of the bus, t
he businessman who
had
bit him
ran
towards the open bus door
with
a multitude of
infected
following on his heels.

Richard grabbed the door control lever and swung
it forward, sending
the bus do
ors folding shut with a hydraulic hiss.

The
business
man slammed face-first aga
inst the shut doors and savagely clawed
at the glass, screaming.

Richard stepped
back
from
the door, hyperventilating as looked around the bus, terrified.

The i
nfected
had
swarmed around
it from all sides, screaming
and
slamming their open
palms
against
it
. They
had torn
the Red Cross banner off the side
of the bus and clawed
at the small shattered passenger windows,
trying to crawl inside.

The businessman at the closed bus doors
continuously scratched
at the narrow door windows, unmindful of his well-manicured fingernails as they tore from his fingers. His bl
oody fingertips
smear
ed
the glass.

Richard stared down at his bit left hand, trembl
ing. If there was any question before…

Well, i
f the vomit didn’t do
you in, then that damn bite did
.

“I know that,” Richard hissed at Andy.

Face it. Y
ou’ll never make it to Bu
tner, Richie.

“Have a little fucking faith. I made it this far, didn’t I?” Richard snapped back.
He
searched
the floor for s
omething to wrap the wound with. He thought the clothes on the corpses slumped in the back seats, but decided that
he
didn’t have the nerve
to g
et near them if he could help it.

Outside, more i
nfected gather
ed
around the bus
and caused it to rock side-to-side.

Near the front of the bus,
Richard
found a dirtied
plaid
shirt lying
across
one of the seats. He
tore a
strip off of
it apart
with his teeth and went to
work wrapping
his wounded hand.

In the last row of
bus
seats
near the emergency exit, behind t
wo
slumped
bullet-riddled corpses, a man wearing a bloodied
Red Cross shirt slowly rose to his feet
. His left eye
was
gouged out and
burnt
flesh hung off of the left side of his face
in clumps
, exposing muscle and bone. ‘
Volunteer
’ was etched across the back of his
shirt in
black lettering and a
silver
key ring dangl
ed
off of his belt. His
right
eye
was
fixated on Richard, who
had his back turned towards him
.

Th
e man
took a single step forward
towards Richard,
causing the keys
attached to his belt to jingle.

The jingling of keys, so quiet and innocent compared to the ruckus
coming from
outside of the bus,
somehow rose above the ambient noise and snatched Richard’s attention.

Rich
ard
spun around.

The man
charged towards Richard with his arms outstretched, screaming
.

The horde gathered outside
the bus went into frenzy.

Richard panicked
and turned to run towards the front of the bus
, terrified.

The volunteer dove
onto Richard’s back and latched on. He bit into hi
s shoulder, im
mediately causing blood to seep
through
Richard’s shirt
.

Richard screamed in agony and
spun around, viciously shaking side-to-side, trying to throw the man off of him.

The
ma
n kept his arms wrapped
around Richa
rd’s chest and kept his legs fastened around his waist.

Richard threw himself backwards against the dashboard as hard as he could
–

There man’s back smashed against the metallic door lev
er that protruded from the dash and his spine made
a
sickening sound. The hydraulic bus doors
gave a slight hiss as the
y folded open just an inch…

The
man screamed, let go of Richard, and sunk to the ground.

Richard
backpedaled
away
from the man, frantically hyperventilating.

The man, unable to use his
paralyzed
lower extremities, started
to
dr
ag himself along the aisle
with his
hands towards Richard, snarling.

Richard screamed at the top of his lungs
and
brought
his foot down on the back of the man’s head
… again… again… and again, allowing himself get lost in fevered repetition.

What remained of the man’s head looked like a gory mesh of tissue, hair,
blood,
and
small
fragments
of bone. T
he man lay motionless.

Richard stepped back and tried to compose himself. One leg was
covered in the man’s blood. He st
ared down at
his hands as they trembled uncontrollably.

The
folding doors at the front of the bus op
ened up another few inches as the i
nfected gathered outside slid their fingers between the
doors and started to pry them apart
.

Richard
sprung forward
and grabbed the door lever
with both hands. Using all of his
body
weight, he
p
ushed the lever back to the left and the hydraulic mechanism locked back into place.

The bus doors
snapped
shut on the
intruding
fingers
and created a series
of audible cracks. Some
of the
fingers plumped and burst
open
, sp
raying blood, while others snapped
off and
fell to the floor.

The infected
outside cried
out
in protest and
rocked
the bus even more
violently.

Rich
ard
plopped down on the driver’s seat and stared out the cracked windshield.

The i
nfected were clustered
tightly all
around the bus, but
past the mass of bodies
there appeared to be nothing but scattered vehic
les littering the parking lot and p
ast the parking lot
he saw
the street…

You’ll never make it out. This is a goddamn city bus, not a bulldozer.
Y
ou’ll
never make it Butner to save me…

“NO!
NO!
I will make it!
”

You’re infected. You’re as good as dead. I was counting on you…

“Shut up. I told you that I’ll save you.”

Richard
reached for the ignition switch–

No key.

He turned
towards the Red Cross volunteer’s corpse lying on the floor a
n
d
stared at
the keys attached to the man’s belt.

He quickly leapt towards the man and
unlatched the keys from the
corpse’s
belt.

The rear emergency exit door
’s window
shattered and a multitude of arms reached into
the bus, feeling desperately for
the door release
handle
.

Richard
ran back to
the driver’s seat, slid the key into the ignition, and cranked the engin
e.

The diesel engin
e rumbled to life and sent the i
nfect
ed outside into hysterics as they tried to bash their way inside
.

At the back of the bus, one of the hands managed to
grasp the red bar and pulled it up–

The emergency
door swung open and knocked the group gathered around it
backwards. Two soldiers
bolted over the toppled corpses and sta
rted
climbing their way into the bus.

Richard floored
the accelerator
.

The bus
jerked forward and crushed the i
nfected gathered
in front of it. It plowed a gory path through the sea of corpses as it picked up speed and its diesel engine spewed
exhaust.
The windshield quickly caked with blood-splatter and made seeing through the glass nearly impossible.

Within seconds, the bus had broken free from the bodies surrounding it.

T
he
two infected
soldiers
tumbled
backwards
out of the bus as it jolted forward. One soldier spiraled out onto the pavement and snapped his neck, but the other soldier held onto the bus by digging his fingernails
into the strip of rubber that ran
the expanse of the center aisle.

The infected horde chased after the bus but started to fall behind as it gained speed.

Richard tried to navigate the vehicle-littered parking lot, but couldn’t see through the smeared glass. He squinted and leaned forward to–

The bus slammed a
gainst the side of a flame-gutted sedan
and sent it skittering out of the
way.

Ric
hard jolted forward and quickly fastened his seatbelt, not letting his foot of off the accelerator.

T
he solider
at the back of the bus
managed to
pull himself back into the bus and stood up. He started stumbling towards–

The bus crashed between two cars
and sent
both cars
skidding in opposite directions
with their car alarms wailing.

T
he
s
oldier tumbl
ed
backwards out of the bus. He hit the asphalt head
first and lay motionless.

Richard blindly plowed through
vehicle afte
r vehicle and knocked them
out of the way
like toy cars, creating
a consonance of
wailing
car alarms. S
moke
billowed
through the vents
and the amber ‘Check Engine’
display
lit up
on the dashboard, but he didn’t care as he
kept the accelerator mashed firml
y against
the floor
board
.

The distance between the pursuing horde and the bus grew greater and greater. Some of the i
nfected
gave up r
unning
after it and aimlessly veered
off
in other directions.

Richard stared at the horde in the rearview mirror and an
exasperated laugh escaped from between his lips
.
He–

The bus crashed to a grinding halt against a metallic light pole at the end of the parking lot. The light pole threw a shower of sparks from its base and the
n toppled over into the empty street.