Psych Ward Zombies (10 page)

Dave realized that he had just stepped into a nest of zombies. This realization had occurred as he was flying through the air. He had left his feet and was traveling backward through the doorway. Chester grabbed the back of Dave’s belt and yanked him out of the room as the zombified doctors lunged for him. Once Dave was clear of the doorway, Janet hurriedly slammed the door shut again. In the brief time the door had been open, Chester had witnessed Hassan, Golski, and Thompson in the room. They were obviously undead. However, no one had seen Horton in the midst of the chaos.

Chester grasped the door handle and held it tightly to prevent the door from being pulled open from inside. Dave yelled, “Horton! Are you okay? Where are you?”

Horton responded, “I’m trapped in the coat closet! Please, get me out of here!” This partly explained why his voice seemed so muffled, although he also sounded tired and very weak.

Janet, Chester, and Dave discussed their options. Janet argued that Horton was perfectly safe in the closet and could wait there until help arrived. She had no interest in fighting the three zombie doctors. Chester suggested they might assault the room, free Horton, and then enjoy a four to three advantage over the zombies. Dave’s idea was to let the zombies out of the room one at a time and fight them with an even greater number advantage. The problem with Dave’s plan was that the door opened into Devlin’s office. They would not be able to release the zombies one by one unless someone stood at the door and held the door open while a zombie squeezed by. It was physically impossible
.

Janet proposed an idea. “What if we tied something to the door knob? We could push the door open, wait for one zombie to come out, and then pull the door shut from a safe distance.” It was a good plan, and neither of the men could think of a better idea. There was only one small problem - they had no rope
.

They scoured the room, looking for anything that could be used as a rope. Dave tried unraveling the carpet, hoping to braid the strands of thread together. The carpet was bound together tightly, however, and Dave could not get it to come apart. Janet examined the leather couch and chairs. The leather could not be torn, but it could possibly be cut. She trotted over to the doorway and picked up the scissors that had been used to pry the bracket off the door. The process had left the scissors irreparably bent and non-functional. Dave noticed her efforts and recalled the small knife Chester had given him earlier. He pulled the knife from his pocket and offered it to Janet.

The two of them took a cushion from one of the chairs and proceeded to cut the leather upholstery into strips. The leather strips were tied together end to end. In several minutes the strand had reached about fifteen feet in length. While the makeshift rope was being formed, Chester continued to hold the door tightly shut. The leather rope was tied to the handle of the door. Chester gave it a strong tug, and it felt secure. He handed the rope to Janet.

Chester picked up the metal water cooler stand and held it over his head like a club. Then he positioned himself just to the right of the doorway. Dave had all the children move to the side of the room farthest from the door. He took the magazine-covered table and turned it on its side as a sort of shield in front of the kids. Janet grasped the leather rope and stood as far as possible from the door, angled just to the left of the opening. Dave looked to his companions expectantly. Chester and Janet each nodded that they were ready. Dave signaled to Chester, who pushed the door open with a shove.

They were expecting the three doctor zombies to come barreling through the door in unison. However, the door opening turned out to be anticlimactic. Instead of rushing out of the office, the zombies shuffled nonchalantly in random circles. They seemed to have already forgotten about Dave’s earlier intrusion. Hassan noticed the open doorway and stumbled toward it. As he neared the door, he could see Dave standing in the center of the reception room. This triggered him to lurch forward in a staggering pursuit of his intended prey. As he passed through the doorway, Chester smashed the water cooler stand down on Hassan’s head. Hassan crumpled to the floor as Janet gave the leather rope a sharp yank. The door slammed shut just as Hassan’s head hit the floor. His skull had been cracked open, allowing the contents to escape onto the carpet. The brains had a moth-eaten appearance.

Chester grabbed the corpse by the legs and dragged it out of the way. “One down, two to go,” he beamed.

Once everyone had reset themselves, Dave gave the signal to open the door again. Chester held the metal stand above his head with one hand, while pushing the door open with the other. Golski and Thompson were standing beside the door and simultaneously flung themselves at the opening. Both zombies were now in front of the open door, and there was no way to segregate them. They pushed into the reception area in close formation and then split apart once they were free of the doorway. Golski turned toward Chester, who brought the metal stand down like an ax. The blow glanced off Golski’s head and landed on his shoulder. The bones inside his shoulder splintered, but it was not enough to stop the zombie from advancing.

Meanwhile, Thompson stumbled toward Dave. Even in her zombified state, Thompson still wore one of her signature cat-hair-covered sweaters. The undead are not known for their fashion sense. Dave had not been expecting to be charged by one of the zombies, so he was unarmed. He dodged and juked, trying to avoid the lumbering zombie. Thompson lashed out at him with her arms, nearly making contact with Dave’s head.

As Dave evaded the female zombie, Chester took another swing at Golski with the metal stand. He connected with Golski’s chin. The force shattered the vertebrae in the neck and ruptured most of the tendons that attached to the skull. Golski’s head flipped back like an enormous Pez dispenser before his body collapsed backward. The metal stand twisted and bent with the impact, folding over into an L-shape.

Thompson had cornered Dave by the elevator and began to close in for the kill. Janet had witnessed Dave’s plight and sprang into action. She launched herself into a high kick, impacting Thompson on the right flank. Thompson was knocked off balance and stumbled several steps before falling to the floor. She did not remain down for long, but rose quickly and started toward Janet. Janet assumed a fighting stance and waited for her opponent to draw near. She then unleashed a low roundhouse kick to the side of Thompson’s knee. The decrepit ligaments in Thompson’s knee snapped like strands of spaghetti. The knee buckled inward and Thompson fell, almost landing atop Janet. Thompson struggled to her knees but was unable to stand. Janet rushed forward and placed a knee strike against Thompson’s head. The zombie fell to the ground and Janet descended on top of her. Janet pummeled the zombie’s face with her fists, landing a rapid succession of blows. Thompson stopped writhing after the eighth punch.

Chester and Dave both turned to Janet, surprised by her impressive display of violence against the zombie. Janet flexed both her biceps and remarked, “I do mixed martial arts at the gym. I gotta admit - it feels good to kick a little butt.”

As the group celebrated their victory over the putrefied physicians, Luther remained stationary at the bottom of the stairs. His unblinking eyes fixated on the steps before him. The assorted images of various feet walking up stairs still flashed through his mind. However, in the past several minutes the images had begun to coalesce. Instead of hundreds of tiny thoughts, there was now a single growing mass of ideas. The small ideas swirled around and stuck to the larger idea, like the platelets adhering to an emerging clot
.

Luther raised his right foot, slowly. It lingered in the air for several moments before descending on top of the first tread. He leaned forward gradually, appearing like a tree about to topple. Once his weight rested on his right leg, however, he steadied himself. With speed that would make a snail laugh in derision, Luther drew his weight upward onto the first step. Once his left foot was planted beside the right, Luther’s mouth curled into a contorted grin.

The zombie doctors were no longer a threat, so it was now safe to enter Devlin’s office. Dave walked into room and looked around. The office was illuminated by a single emergency light just above the door. The lighting was dim, but Dave was able to visualize a massive desk, walls lined with books, and a couple of luxurious rugs. The desk was strewn with papers. Along one wall there was a table, cluttered with stacks of files and boxes. The place had apparently been a mess even before the zombies ran amok inside. On the wall opposite the table there was a small door, which Dave presumed to be the hiding place of his friend Horton. Dave opened the door and peered inside. Horton was lying on the floor of the coat closet. He did not make an effort to rise once the door had been opened.

Dave crouched to get a closer look at Horton. “Hey, are you okay?” he asked.

Horton groaned, “I’m alive, for now. But I’m really messed up. Devlin poisoned us.” His breathing had developed a perceptible rattle. Dave pulled Horton out of the closet and situated him on one of the thick rugs. The light was better here, and Dave could see that his friend was showing the tell-tale signs of decay.

“Devlin did this?” Dave asked. “How? Why?”

“He called everyone up to his office and was acting all weird. He was rambling on about the end of the world and how he was going to be some kind of torch bearer,” Horton said, pausing to cough up a small chunk of bloody lung tissue. “I don’t know what the hell he was talking about. He told us... He told us about a plan he had. Something about raising an army of the dead inside the hospital. It sounded like non... nonsense. The plan involved poisoning everybody with some sort of man-made virus... or something.”

Dave considered what Horton had said. “That explains at least some of what’s going on. Did he say how he was going to poison people?”

“He said something about the cafeteria. I think he might have put something in the food.”

The pieces of the puzzle were starting to fall together. Dave, Janet, and Chester had all brought their own food from home. This explained why they had not been affected. It also explained the rapid spread throughout the adult section of the hospital. Dave considered the ten rambunctious kids in the next room. “Did he mention the kids’ cafeteria?”

Horton wheezed, straining to respond. “I don’t know. He just said, ah, ‘the cafeteria’. He got us too.”

“Us? You mean the physicians?” Dave queried.

“Yeah. All of us except for you. But I think he tried to get you too. Oh, God, I feel like I’m losing my mind.” Horton’s eyes had started to cloud over and his breathing had become more labored.

“Hang on, man. We’ll get you some help,” Dave offered, although no one believed the words
.

“No. Devlin said there was no
...” His voice started to trail off. “No cure. Please. Don’t let me hurt anybo...” Silence overtook him abruptly as his face twisted into a grimace. Dave jumped back and watched as his old friend crossed into the area between life and death. Killing Mert would have been hard enough, but this was his friend. Chester stepped forward and prepared to stomp Horton’s head into a puddle. Dave put his hand on Chester’s arm and uttered a plaintive “No.”

Chester looked to Dave, though he continued to draw his foot upward for the fatal blow. He knew that once Horton got onto his feet they would all be in danger
.

“Wait. Hold him down,” Dave said
.

Chester placed his foot on Horton’s sternum, rendering the zombie unable to rise. Dave walked to the edge of the rug and picked up the end. He carried the end forward, dropping it over Horton as Chester stepped aside. Chester caught on to the plan, and joined Dave in rolling the zombie’s squirming body into the rug like a giant burrito. The rolled carpet enveloped Horton so tightly he could not move. Horton could not breathe either, but zombies have no need for breathing anyway.

Dave sat beside his cocooned friend and tried to make sense of the day’s events.

“If Devlin put zombie juice in the cafeteria’s food, that’s why all the adult patients are now zombies. But I know the doctors didn’t eat in the cafeteria today. And Luther didn’t eat in the cafeteria either, because he got to the ward too late,” Dave said. “So how did the doctors and Luther get turned into zombies?”

Janet broke in, “I saw Devlin bring a sack lunch to the ward for Luther, so that question is easy. Maybe Devlin fed the doctors something too.”

Dave’s mind raced. If Devlin had fed the doctors tainted food, it probably would have been at the medical staff meeting or in this office. The answer to the riddle suddenly became clear when his eyes landed on the box of doughnuts. The box of doughnuts that had sat on the table in the staff meeting was now right in front of him
.

Chester was holding the open box, looking down at its contents. Dave initially surmised that Chester was merely examining the evidence. However, when Chester looked up at Dave, his face did not reveal cognizance. Instead, he seemed perplexed that Dave was staring at him.

“Uh, what’s wrong?” Chester asked slowly. He was afraid to ask the question.

“Did you
...?” Dave’s question was even more frightening to ask. “Did you eat one of those doughnuts?”

Chester sat the box on the desk without taking his eyes off Dave. “Yes,” he replied guardedly. “I was hungry. Why?”

Dave dashed to the desk and looked inside the box. There was one doughnut left. “How many did you eat, Chester?”

“I only had two. Look, man, if you’re mad that I didn’t save you one, then I’m sorry. I had to eat.
”

Dave put both hands on the big man’s shoulders and stared him in the eyes. “You’ve got to make yourself puke! The doughnuts are poisoned!”

Chester lunged toward a small trash can beside the desk and tried gagging himself. He stuck his whole hand down the back of his throat, but this elicited only modest gags. He tried over and over, but could not provoke himself to vomit. He repeated this unsuccessfully for several minutes, until his throat and stomach were both sore from the ineffective heaving.

“Dammit!” Chester yelled. “Why can’t I ever vomit when I want to? When I don’t want to, it just comes right out!” He collapsed onto the floor with his back against the desk.

Janet looked to Dave. “Isn’t there some kind of antidote or some kind of medicine you can give him?” she pleaded.

Dave was powerless. As far as he knew, there was no antidote. Even if there were some sort of medication that could help, Dave had no access to any medications in their current predicament. The hospital pharmacy would be locked down tight and there were dozens of zombies between here and there. In desperation, Dave ran out the door to the reception area and brought back the reservoir tank from the water cooler. He told Chester to start chugging the water. He hoped that whatever toxin was in the doughnuts might be diluted enough to be less dangerous. At the very least, if Chester engorged his stomach with enough water, it might cause him to vomit. Chester held the clear jug to his mouth and began drinking the water as quickly as possible. Some of the water splashed down his chin, soaking his beard, but most of it was swallowed. Dave watched and tried to estimate the amount of water Chester had ingested. He guessed it was about two or three liters.

When the tank was empty, Chester dropped it to the floor and flopped backward against the desk. He was sweating and obviously in physical and emotional distress. “I really don’t feel good,” he mumbled. The words had just left his mouth when they were quickly followed by a geyser of fluid. The stream emanated from his mouth and nose, projecting four to five feet in front of him. It was mostly water, but also contained an assortment of cheese puffs and half-chewed doughnut particles. There was also a sizable amount of blood.

Janet and Dave had been crouching in front of their friend, and they jumped aside once the eruption started. However, both ended up with soaked pants and shoes. The vomit had the normal smell of stomach contents, but also contained a hint of putrescence. They all knew this was very bad indeed, but everyone tried to put on a brave face.

“Hey, well, at least you got most of it out. You’re a big guy, and you’re strong,” Janet said with hollow reassurance. “I think you’ll be okay.”

Chester played along, although he knew as well as anyone where things were headed for him. “Yeah. Don’t worry about me. I’m feeling better already.”

This game of denial was cut short when Samuel came running into Devlin’s office. “I think help is coming!” he shouted enthusiastically. “I heard someone coming up the stairs!”

Dave looked to Chester with an expression that signified a mix of hope and despair. Then he bolted from the office and ran to the reception area. Dave stopped in front of the stack of furniture that blocked the entrance to the stairwell. Some of the children were bustling around and talking, and Dave shushed them with a menacing glare and a finger in front of his lips. The room fell silent. Dave listened intently for sounds from the stairwell
.

At first he heard nothing. His mind started to convince himself that Samuel had simply been mistaken. It was a false alarm, he thought. However, the reality of the situation became apparent when Dave heard a solid thud from behind the furniture
.

“Hello? Is anyone there?” he sputtered timidly. He held his breath and waited.

Less than a minute later, a similar thud occurred. This one sounded slightly closer. Dave peered through a tiny crack between the upturned sofa and the entryway. The poor light of the stairwell made it difficult to see anything, but Dave could detect the faint outline of a figure ascending the steps. The figure was very large and moved with a deliberate slowness. The recognition of Luther’s shadowy outline was like a punch to the gut.

Janet and Chester approached from behind. Dave turned to face them and said grimly, “Luther is still alive, and he’s coming up the stairs.”

Chester was still in shock from his own predicament. His progression through the Kubler-Ross Stages of Grief was proceeding right on track. He had left Denial and was now well-embedded in the stage of Anger. His only discernible emotion was rage, and he longed for a fight. His face flushed. His eyes bulged slightly. “Bring it on! I’ll rip off his head and stick it up-”

Dave interrupted, “Hang on. I think Luther may be different than the other zombies. There’s something about him that seems far more dangerous.”

The warning did nothing to deter Chester’s angry thirst for violence. The idea of some sort of Super-Zombie made him welcome the challenge that much more. However, the fact that Chester’s brain was starting to rot from the inside also limited his capacity for rational thought.

“I don’t care,” he snorted. “I want revenge!” He punched the sofa hard enough to rip the leather cushion. Dave wanted to calm the big man, but he was concerned Chester might actually hurt him in his current mental state. Janet stepped forward and grabbed Chester by the arm. She took his large mitt in both her hands with a firm but gentle grip
.

Her voice wavered a little, as if fighting back the urge to cry. “I don’t want you to get hurt, Chester. There’s still a chance we can help you, and fighting Luther is not going to solve our problems.
”

Chester looked into her eyes, and then turned toward the stairwell. He could not see past the stacked furniture, but his mind could imagine the object of his hatred just a couple dozen feet away. He clenched his eyes shut and balled his fists tightly. His entire body trembled. Janet took a step backward, fearing Chester could lash out indiscriminately
.

Chester relaxed his arms and slowly opened his eyes. The tension faded into a surreal calm, like the cool dampness that follows a summer thunderstorm. He turned to face Janet again, then cast his eyes to the floor. “Okay. Okay,” he repeated softly, backing away a few steps. He walked to the center of the room and faced the opposite window. The children in the room shrank against the walls, unsure whether Chester was a protector or a threat
.

“We need a plan,” Dave interjected. “Maybe we could use the same plan we used with the doctors, and ambush him as he comes into the room.”

“That plan requires a weapon,” Chester said. He had composed himself quickly, although now he was appearing freakishly calm. “The only weapon we had was the metal water cooler thing. It’s useless now.” He picked up the warped metal object and held it aloft to show everyone its worthlessness. Feeling the point was made, he tossed it aside.

Janet glanced at the elevator doors. Without saying a word, she walked over and started prying the doors apart with her fingers. Dave did not understand her line of thinking, but helped her pull the doors open. They peered down the shaft into the darkness and saw the top of the elevator car parked at the first floor.

“Crap,” she said. “I thought we could hide in the elevator.”

Chester approached and produced the flashlight. He cast the beam into the darkness. “There’s no hatch on top of the elevator car, so we can’t go down this way either.”

Dave reached for the light and Chester handed it to him. Dave grabbed the elevator door and leaned inward. He could see a small ladder spanning the height of the elevator shaft.

“Wait a minute. If we’re on the top floor and the ladder still goes up from here
...” he said aloud, mainly to himself.