Our Undead (61 page)

Sector333-3:
***ALERT… SELF DESTRUCT SEQUENCE HAS BEEN ACTIVATED… PURGING
WILL COMMENCE IN… THIRTY MINUTES… ALERT… SELF DESTRUCT SEQUENCE HAS
BEEN ACTIVATED… PURGING WILL COMMENCE IN… THIRTY
MINUTES…***

Accompanied by a churning
siren, the compound announces to the population, its inevitable
fate.

Feleider:
Impeccable timing, young lady. Time to go.
HOLDEN! THERE IS NO TIME FOR THIS! WE MUST
GO!

Holden doesn't pay the
General any mind. He is still too busy trying to get his
disgustingly persistent teammate off of his back, and Kerrick tries
to assist him in that effort, but Sharp is not making it easy for
either of them. It seems Kerrick needs her help after all, so Erika
leaves Billy and Gwen by Margaret side to go and assist
him.

Erika:
Would you guys
please
stop acting like a couple of
children?!

Feleider:
UNIT HOLDEN,
END
THIS!!

Billy:
Come on, Margaret. Let's go.

He and Gwen help Margaret
back up on to her crutches. Kerrick and Erika end up pulling the
same trick Sharp had pulled earlier, tripping Holden again. Both he
and Sharp fall to the ground. He doesn't let go, but the leverage
from them being on the floor gives Kerrick and Erika a better shot
at prying them apart. There isn't much Holden can do with all three
of his teammates battling on top of him.

Margaret:
Gwen, can you please let Abe down, now?

Feleider:
HOLDEN, IF YOU DON'T GET THEM OFF OF YOU RIGHT NOW, HEADS
WILL BE LOST!!

With that threat, Feleider
pulls the handgun from his side and aims it square at the feuding
team of elite soldiers, sadly, all of them are too busy to notice
him.

Gwen:
Feleider, stop!! Don't shoot them!!

Margaret:
Professor, please let Abe down.

Gwen:
General, where does it end?!!

Feleider:
It doesn't, it gets better!

Margaret:
Professor, please!! Take Abe down!!!

Gwen:
Doctor Bernard, would you please take her friend down from
the bed?

Bernard starts for the
controls but stops two steps after, distracted by everything that
is going on.

Gwen:
General, please put the gun away.

Feleider:
One well-placed shot will separate them. Perhaps no one will
have to die.

The general takes aim at
the four unsuspecting super soldiers again, and lowers his brow so
he can focus better. It makes Margaret feel incredibly nervous, for
Abe is in line with the tussling four, still trapped and on display
behind them. If by some chance the General misses his shot, he
might hit Abe. He might not even have to miss. The bullet might
just go through them and hit Abe anyway. She can't have that
happen.
But why isn't he descending
yet?
She turns her head to figure out what
the hold up is and sees that Bernard has ignored Gwen, just as Gwen
had ignored her. The cowardly doctor stands there frozen. He hadn't
even taken five steps toward the damn controls.

Her irritation had been
building ever since she first stepped into this room and saw that
they had Abe slung up like some carcass in a butcher's shop window.
It grew larger and more potent every time they ignored her request
for him to be taken down. Seeing once again that they've failed to
meet her request, Margaret gets pushed over the edge.

Margaret:
WOULD SOMEONE PLEASE TAKE ABE DOWN FROM THERE
RIGHT FUCKING NOW!!

Her imposingly loud voice
shakes General Feleider out of his focus. His annoyance, too, has
been building, for as much time, if not much longer than
Margaret's, and it just so happens that her outburst causes him to
get pushed over his own little edge.

Feleider:
Young lady, your friend is a mistake and an abomination of
what the
true
Conditioning represents! Let me do you a
favor!

He changes the trajectory of the bullet and pulls the
trigger.
**POW*

THE ORIGIN - PART 3

Five zombies have broken
through the front window and are pushing their way through, one by
one, plopping on to the floor on the inside of the house. The
father stays in between the monsters and his family, and then yells
for them to leave out the back door. He waves them off in that
direction and his wife leaves, but not before grabbing a family
photo that sits on credenza in their living room. The father looks
around the room for something he might be able to use as a weapon,
but there is nothing of use so he follows his wife and daughter to
the back of the house.

In the backyard, his women
are waiting for him. They are both wondering what to do, but even
the father isn't sure. What the hell is going on?! His senses
become clear for a moment, and he realizes that he still has his
car keys in his hands. The best thing to do now is get away from
the area, so he leads them around to the side of the house heading
for the car, but not before grabbing a shovel from out of the
toolshed.

The father pushes the side
gate open and is followed closely behind by his wife. His daughter
is behind his wife, but her shirt gets snagged in the gated fence
when she tries to go through. The blonde teenage girl tugs on her
shirt, but no matter how hard she pulls she can't get it free. The
zombies that had broken in through the front window have already
made it out through the back, and they begin rounding the corner
that the family is heading down. When the girl sees them she begins
to panic and calls for her father.

He runs back to her, but
the zombies reach her first. Her panic does her the favor of
keeping the zombies at bay. She kicks at them and pushes them away,
but is just not able to free her shirt from where the fence has it
hooked. The father makes it to her before she takes any fatal
damage, handing the car keys off to his wife when he passes her. He
clubs the closest zombie over the head with the shovel and sends it
to the ground. The other one makes an attempt to grab the father's
arm, but the man moves out of the way and cracks down on this one's
skull, too. The third one is still a little behind, making its way
around the corner, so the father takes the opportunity to rip his
daughter's shirt free. He bellows for her to run and follows behind
her, closing the fence to make it as hard as possible for the last
three zombies to follow them to the front.

When he gets to the front
of the house, his neighborhood has completely transformed. Less
than ten minutes ago, he had pulled into the driveway with his
daughter. Everything had appeared normal at that point. Or maybe
they weren't. Maybe he and his daughter were to into their own
heated discussion to notice that the world around them was falling
apart. Now, on the streets in front of their home, people are being
chased by groups of growling monsters, screams can be heard far off
in the distance, as well as close by, and there are more people out
of the street than there has ever been in the past,
ever.

He hurries his family into
the car, telling his wife to drive while he gets into the passenger
seat and his daughter gets into the back. The wife tries to start
the car right away, but her trembling hands make it fairly
difficult. He doesn't want to put too much pressure on her, but
when he sees the zombies from behind his house making their way out
to the front, he has no choice but to voice to her their presence.
The support seems to work. The shaken woman gets the keys in the
ignition and starts the car. The zombies from their backyard try to
chase them down, but they never catch up as the family reverses out
of the driveway and accelerates down the street.

The streets outside of
their immediate neighborhood are not as busy and panicked. The
father assumes that in this initial phase of The Crater Lake
Contagion, most of the action must be allocated in the
neighborhoods and medical spaces where most families must be trying
to keep their sick relatives safe, only to have them change
unexpectedly. The roads are calm for the time being, but they would
have to expect the worst when they get to the city. The signs begin
to prove the father's assumptions correct. They start passing
abandoned cars on the road and start to see more people running
feverishly out of alleys and apartment buildings. Even some stores
and facilities already have their windows shut, blocked, or in the
process of being boarded up. It is fascinating in a dreadful sort
of way, how soon the effects of this new disease are becoming
visually evident all around them. They need to find somewhere safe
to hold up, figure out what the whole story is, and the sooner the
better.

Their journey takes an
unfortunate turn when an oblivious group of citizens unknowingly
run out on to the street. The wife has to make a sharp turn in
order to miss them, and then another one to avoid hitting an
abandoned car. They roll up on to the curb and collide into a fire
hydrant. Everyone seems to be okay as far as the father can tell
when he takes a brief check of everyone in the car. They have no
other choice but to get out. The wife and mother makes sure not to
forget her framed picture.

Outside, they can even
smell the changes that are happening. A smoky aroma now fills their
once moderately fresh smelling air. The area is relatively safe
from the looks of it. People are running around, a few are driving
by, but there is no sight of any zombies. The father looks around
and sees one of the city's hostels, located across the street on
the next block. He gestures in its direction and lets his family
know that that is where they would be heading. They agree and start
for it, running closely packed together in the hostel's
direction.

First, they cross the
street diagonally and are barely missed by a speeding car. Luckily,
they are able to see it in time. When they make it to the other
side of the road, they jog down the sidewalk for the hostel's front
entrance. On the way there, they approach an alleyway. Earlier,
they had seen a small group of people running out of it, but they
never saw anything following behind them. It never registers to any
of the family members that whatever was chasing the people might
still be coming. They soon find out that the chasers are definitely
still in pursuit of those people who were running away.

The father is in front of
his wife and daughter as they run past the opening of the alley. As
a consequence of that, and not paying attention to blind corners,
he is the one who gets sideswiped by the zombies exiting it. Three
of them, two male and one female, knock him over, and his wife and
daughter jump back to avoid them. Two of the zombies end up on the
ground on top of the father. The other male doesn't get a chance to
pounce, but he looks to the left and sees the two frightened women.
Stuck between a rock and a hard place, the wife backs herself and
her daughter away from the zombie that has its sights on them, only
to watch her husband on the ground fighting two of them off by
himself.

He isn't doing a bad job of
it, though. The shovel he brought with him helps to keep them from
getting too close to his face. In an effort to get one of them off
of him, simplify things for himself, he thrusts violently to the
left. It works, sending the female zombie off of him and on to the
concrete beside him, but the male doesn't get thrown back as far
and comes back on top of him quickly. The father doesn't have time
to reset and leaves his left arm open to the zombie, which takes
full advantage of the opening. It manages to grab hold of it and
bites down into the father's arm around the triceps
area.

His cry of pain is too much
for his wife to take. Her eyes and head shuffle around the area and
stop on a pile of garbage, upon which sits a mound of wood pieces.
She hands her daughter the photo and runs over to it to grab the
healthiest looking piece she can find. It isn't quite the size of a
two-by-for, but it would have to do. She tests it first on the male
zombie coming after her and her daughter. She gives it three good
smacks to the head, screaming in trepidation. To think, she would
ever have to deliberately beat someone in the head, even if it is a
zombie -- she has to scream through it. She gets it to the ground
after a few more good hits and runs over to help her
husband.

The female zombie he had
been able to knock off of him, is in the process of getting back up
for another go, but his wife comes up behind it and screaming,
strikes it in the head with a mighty downward swing. The female
zombie falls to the ground, motionless, just as the father finally
gets the last male zombie off of him. His wife comes to his side,
as he gets back up to his feet, grimacing from the pain of the bite
wound on his left arm. Even with it, he manages to lift the shovel
and deliver a deathblow to the last remaining zombie.

With a moment to think, his
wife and daughter question if he is okay or not, but he knows that
they still won't be safe unless they get inside. He hurries them to
get to the entrance of the hostel at the next building, impatiently
pointing to it, so his daughter runs to check it. She tries to open
it, but the thing is locked shut. She resorts to banging on it,
calling out in hopes that someone on the inside will hear her, but
no one does as her parents come to her side. They join her. Maybe
someone will hear if all three of them start banging and calling,
but they fail to gain the sort of attention they are looking
for.