The Lazarus Impact (10 page)

CHAPTER 19

Marcus wanders alone through the woods heading south. In anguish, he wonders if he could have done more to prevent what happened. Regret fills him, but what he needed to do would’ve required him to break his vow to not harm the living. He curses himself as he walks.

They burned down the empty highway at breakneck speed in the delivery truck. Whenever they came upon an abandoned vehicle they siphoned off any gas they could. They were down to fumes when they happened upon a group of travelers at a rest stop on the other side of the highway.

“Hang on!” Harley yelled as they bounded across the grass between the south and north arteries, aiming the truck right at their family friendly sport utility wagon. He screeched to a stop just inches from them. As if understood by all, Harley and his gang jumped out of the truck, brandishing weapons and yelling. “Get the fuck out of the car! Get your ass on the ground!” Marcus was confused and in shock. But part of him was excited, he admitted that much to himself. The lure of his old ways tore at him, trying to claw him back into that familiar comfort zone of taking, hurting, killing. The easy way through life. The adrenaline coursed through his veins, pumping hate through his body. It found familiar pathways to trigger old memories; what to say, how to act, how to crazy-up his eyes to instill the most fear. It all came rushing back. But he resisted.

“Get the fuck out of the car! Get your ass on the ground!” Harley and his men commanded.

One of the travelers didn’t listen. A young kid, maybe 19. “Leave us alone!” he yelled back, defiant. He was the oldest male among what must have been his mother, a younger sister, and a still younger brother; they all looked alike. The eldest kid was their protector, and Harley wanted what he was protecting. The car. The gas. Whatever it was, it didn’t even matter. Without hesitation Harley pistol whipped him, and when he didn’t go down Harley put a bullet in his chest. Just like that. No thought. No pause. His mother ran to him as he dropped to his knees, holding him in her arms one last time.

“I said get on the ground!” The younger kids listened through their tears, but mom was still clinging to her oldest son as he faded into the afterlife. Harley wouldn’t tolerate insolence. He pressed the gun to her temple and squeezed the trigger, coating her dead son and the rear fender of their car with brains. They tied the young boy up and shoved him in the truck, and they took the girl off the highway into the woods one at a time. Marcus could only imagine what they did to her. She couldn’t have been much older than 16.

When Harley finally calmed himself down from the rampage, Marcus told him he was leaving and would go his separate way. Despite not really wanting to, Marcus shook Harley’s hand in return when he extended it.

The young girl’s tear streaked face and the panicked horror in her screams haunt him as he walks.
Is that how others saw me, how she saw Harley then? What kind of monster was I in the eyes of my victims? Worse than the zombies. Have I even truly reformed? No. I should have saved her!
The dread she felt at the hands of Harley’s marauders was worse than any zombie could instill in someone. Marcus constantly reassesses his vows, his code. But this is his second chance. This is his test. If he fails now, this world will seem like a day at the beach compared to the hell he imagines; the real hell awaiting him after this one.
Being on the outside is just like being on the inside; trouble has a way of seeking you out
.
You have to work hard to get away from it
.

Up ahead there’s a clearing. A farm. He sees a barn near the edge of the woods. It’s half painted; a fresh coat of white partially covers a flaked and weathered apple red. He creeps inside to find the remaining unopened buckets of white paint. An old 1950s era pickup truck rots on the earthen floor in the middle of the barn, rusting and fading with time. On the walls hang all manner of farming tools. The one that strikes him is the scythe. He takes it in his hand and strokes the blade softly with his fingers.
It’s still sharp
. When he turns he catches a glimpse of himself reflected in the old pickup window, hooded in black and carrying a scythe. He pries open a can of paint and starts to outline the crude shape of a skull on his mask, using the reflection in the pickup window as a mirror. The spots that have too much paint begin to drip down, creating an even more ominous, melted look to the design.

His vows begin to trouble him again.
What about when the living harm the living? I must strike fear into their hearts to stop them
. He sees it as his mission, his duty; the reason God gave him a second chance at life. He would become a reaper; an angel of death to the undead. And if possible he would strike fear into the soulless hearts of the demons that yet live.
Perhaps fear will cause them to stay their sinful hands upon the very sight of me
.

With much of the day left ahead of him, he continues walking on. Following the dirt road out from the farm he eventually comes upon a small town. Empty. He sees a church on the main stretch of town and enters. He seeks guidance from God on his new vow, his mission. “Is this your plan?” he asks aloud, wondering if happening upon a church is a sign that he is on the right path.

A deep voice echoes off the pews and stained glass windows. “Behold, the angel of death.” Marcus stops dead in his tracks and raises his weapon, looking all around for the source. A weathered priest lurks in the shadows behind the altar. He emerges with a rifle over his shoulder. “What is it you seek?” he asks.

“Guidance.” Marcus lowers his scythe.

“Guidance comes from God. All a priest can do is help people to see it,” the priest says.

“Why would God do this to his people?” Marcus asks.

“Maybe God isn’t doing anything. Maybe God is just letting it happen,” the priest suggests.

“God is all powerful. He can stop it if he wants.”

“Sure. But it wouldn’t be unfair if he didn’t. We’re all sinful beings. He could leave us to die but he gives us a chance at forgiveness.” The priest’s eye catches the prison uniform under Marcus’ hooded cape and jacket. “Even you.”

“That’s what I’m trying to figure out. Why? And what am I supposed to do? What’s my purpose?” Marcus asks.

“The why is love, grace. The purpose is for you to find.”

“I think I’m supposed to kill these things, these demons. But when I see men still harming each other in the face of this evil instead of coming together, I wonder if I’m already condemned to hell. I vowed never to harm another person, but I don’t know if I can hold true to it anymore. But you. You’re a priest. Priests are supposed to be peaceful. So what’s a priest doing with a gun?”

“To effectively shepherd those through the valley of the shadow of death, we must have the means to strike down the evil that might block the path. I’m merely protecting my flock, even if it means killing them when they return from death.”

“This is a ghost town. What flock is there?”

“There are some that still live, hiding. I killed the rest. Some were turned, and some weren’t.”

“You’re a priest murderer then.”

“Not all killing is murder. Jesus told his disciples: ‘If you don’t have a sword, sell your cloak and buy one.’ Even he, who turned the other cheek, warned that self defense is necessary at times. You took up a scythe to arm yourself, but only to reap the dead? You vowed to protect the living and do them no harm, but now you see that maybe some of those yet living pose an equal threat to peace. Perhaps the living can be worse than these cannibals. You see, this condition affects the living as well as the dead. Soulless, and driven by nothing but survival, man will abandon all notions of morality, humanity, and consequence in favor of anarchy. With lawlessness comes godlessness. With no eternal consequences for our actions, man becomes beast. We become ravenous, soulless, just like the undead. Only we arrive there through reason, through choice, through a Darwinian survival mentality. I don’t know which demon is worse; the risen or those yet living.”

“So you’re telling me it’s okay to kill people?”

“You must do what you believe is right, son. I have not struck down the good, only the bad. I feel no remorse or regret in it, just as God feels no remorse or regret in denying evil’s entry into his kingdom. Earth is still the kingdom of man, and we remaining kings must protect our castles until we are called to our final home by God. Being a man of God does not mean you cannot defend others, protect yourself, or uproot evil. No. And perhaps now, more than ever, being a man of God even commands those actions. Do not bind yourself to protect these animals at all cost. Nurture those that yet have good in them, and dispatch the ones who are too far gone for saving. Do it not with hate, but rather with prayer, even love. Just as a rancher puts down a horse that is injured beyond repair, or as one puts down a rabid dog.”

“But the rancher owns the horse. It’s different. Putting a man down is not the same. In society that is killing.”

“Ahh but you are no man, and this is no society. You are an angel. The angel of death, loosed from its shackles. A reaper, freed from its cage and set upon this lawless wasteland, this hellish end-of-days, by God himself.” The priest’s eyes are wide with fury.

Marcus begins to question the old priest’s sanity, but he understands his point.
My vows are flawed
.
They have no room for righteous justice
.
Even governments have death penalties and take the lives of men when they’re guilty of the worst crimes
. That was a fate he might have met under different circumstances for the crimes he committed. Marcus sits down in thought.

“Tell me what choice you’ve made that haunts you.” The priest seems to read Marcus like a book as he sits beside him in the pew. Marcus tells him of the incident on the road, how he wanted to help but was afraid of what might happen if he killed again, if he committed the same mortal sins that condemned him. “God is justice but he is also compassion,” the priest says. “He understands your torment. Perhaps he wanted you to act, for God is righteous in his retribution too. These are difficult choices, and they are for you alone to make. Pray. Pray for guidance, and if the time comes again for such decisions, perhaps God will make your path clearer.” Marcus prays with the priest in silence for several moments. They rise together. “Go down to the last house on the left. Eat. Change your clothing. Erase your past. Cleanse and renew yourself. Peel away the old man and become the new man. All that matters now and what is yet to come. Your second chance is here. Seize it,” the priest tells him. “And as for the Lord’s command to sell your cloak and buy a sword, since you already have a scythe, you should keep your cloak. You have a dreadful look with it. The angel of death.” The old priest chuckles as they walk together toward the church doors.

“Some angel, huh? A fallen angel. Or more like a demon. Just like them out there.”

“My son, the angels were the most frightening creatures in the Bible. When people saw them they fainted in awe and fear. I’d much rather face a demon than an angel any day.”

“Can I take one of them with me?” Marcus asks, pointing to a Bible sitting in the pew closest to the doors. The old priest nods his head yes.

CHAPTER 20

Sheryl wakes thinking it was all a bad dream, and that her boys are alive. When her senses return she becomes angry. Her body aches. The early morning sun creeps in through her bedroom window, shining right into her eyes. “Fuck!” she yells, frustrated that her dream of normalcy was not reality. Then the sadness sets in. As she gets dressed she reminds herself that she must press on. She walks into the kitchen for some water. Willy lightly sleeps on the armchair in the living room. He stirs awake when Sheryl closes the pantry door.

They finish packing the car, and Sheryl, Willy and Rocky hop inside, setting out to determine the fate of Sheryl’s husband and make another attempt at Willy’s apartment. Their first stop is her husband’s office, but the parking lot is empty. Same thing at the gym, so back to Hillside they must go, as Sheryl sees that as the only other place her husband could be. Their first stop will be Willy’s apartment, to get his guns.

Hillside is clearer in the day. The cannibals must have dispersed through the town in search of more people to eat. But there are still a few lingering on the grounds, watching the car as it drives along the fence.

“Turn into the far lot, and get as close to the rear entrance as you can,” Willy says. “I’m real close to that door, on the first floor. As long as the hallway isn’t swarmed I can be in and out in under a minute.” But Willy wonders if he can. He fears another episode, another flashback. Things can go bad quickly if he opens that door and suddenly he is on a tunnel clearing mission back in the war. He takes a few deep, calming breaths to prepare himself.

Sheryl pulls into the far lot and lines up the passenger side door with the rear entrance. Willy pops out and shuts the car door quietly. Sheryl immediately locks it. Willy keys himself into the building, disappearing inside. Sheryl looks at her watch, counting off the seconds in her head.

11
...
12
...
13
...

Her eyes keep moving. Her neck cranes as she looks all around.
Are they coming?
The sound of the car door doesn’t seem to have grabbed their attention.

25
...
26
...
27
...

There are two on the grass near the side of the building, one by the street, and a hunched group feeding near the edge of the woods. But others that saw them drive up are starting to wander over.

43
...
44
...
45
...

Sheryl hears a thick muffled gunshot from inside the building. Every hair on her body stands on end. A murder of crows takes to the sky in response, shattering the crisp silence of the morning. Sheryl didn’t even notice them picking at the bodies that lay all over the ground. Her eyes follow them as they fly up into the air. But moments later some of them seize. Their wings stop flapping, and they fall from the sky in mid-flight, crashing back to the ground in death. Rocky begins to bark wildly, and Sheryl struggles to silence him.

52... 53... 54...
Am I counting too fast?

The zombies turn their attention, and they start to run toward the building. She counts six of them, all running in the direction of the gunshot, the direction of the rear entrance to Willy’s building, the direction of Rocky’s barking, the direction of the car.

59
...
60
...
61
...
Shit! It’s more than a minute now
. Sheryl begins to panic. She tries to keep counting in her head, thinking it will calm her, but she just keeps repeating
61
over and over. Her mind races and her eyes dart back and forth between the door and the coming dead.

Another heavy gunshot follows. Startled, she nearly lifts out of her seat. She gasps when Willy kicks open the door and emerges from within with a shotgun on his hip. He steps over a corpse and stands beside the car. Within seconds the zombies are upon them. He unloads shot after shot over the hood of the car as they approach him, pumping empty buckshot shells into the air after each blast. He reaches for the car door but it’s locked. Sheryl fumbles in releasing the mechanism, as one zombie has its face pressed to the driver side window, smearing it with fleshy bits of stink.

“Open up!” Willy’s muddled shout fills Sheryl’s ears between the thuds of shotgun fire. She pops the lock, but Willy circles around to the last beast on her side of the car and blasts it before getting back in. Blood and brain coat the driver’s side window.

“There’s more coming,” he says as he flops a rifle into the back seat and starts stuffing more shells into his short barreled, pump action shotgun. “Inside and outside. People who turned inside got stuck in there. I guess they don’t know how to open doors. I heard ‘em through the walls, scratchin’ around in the apartments on either side of mine. Then there were some in the hallways.”

“Let’s just get out of here,” Sheryl says.

“No. I’ll help you find your husband. Remember what we talked about. If ya don’t look for him you’ll always have regret eatin’ away at yer insides.”

“Regret is better than the dead though,” Sheryl responds. Willy just glares at her, and Sheryl simply nods her head in response.

“Which buildin’ is his mistress in?” he asks.

“The first.”

As Sheryl pulls out of Willy’s lot she sees more zombies running toward them. It’s like they kicked a hornet’s nest and released a deadly fury of blood lust. She mows a few down with the car. The fleshy slaps they make as they collide with the front end of the car make her cringe as if by instinct. But she fights it, and drives over them like speed bumps. When they turn into the other lot they see more of them. The first floor windows to most of the apartments have been broken. The undead climb in and out, feeding on whatever bodies aren’t moving.

Sheryl circles around the rows of cars in the lot. Her husband never knew that she knew where his mistress lived, so if he was here the car would be in plain sight. And it was.

“There,” she points to the new red mid-life crisis. “That’s his car. He must be inside. Believe it or not I’ve been checking every one of these dead bastards to see if one is him. Unless he’s wandered off, he must be up in her apartment. It’s 3G.” She continues to circle the lot, occasionally crunching a zombie under her wheels if they get too close.

“This might get ugly,” Willy says. His building wasn’t as overrun as this one. There are at least 15 by the main door, and a handful at each of the side and rear entrances. “The G units are toward the back. Mine is a G. Small one bedroom. That’s it right there.” He points up to the third floor. The windows are draped with dark curtains. One of the windows is open just a crack. “Okay here’s the plan. We do like we did before, only this time you got to come with me. Keep the car doors closed but unlocked. Rocky stays in the car. Pray that he doesn’t bark again, otherwise we’ll have a swarm waitin’ for us when we leave. Shut the engine so the noise don’t attract ‘em, but leave the keys in the ignition for a fast getaway. Ain’t no one stupid enough to come ‘round here now but us, so don’t worry nuthin’ about someone stealing it. When we get inside, you close the door behind us. When we get into the stairwell, you close the door behind us. In fact, we go through any doors, you close them behind us. Got it?” Sheryl nods. “My key can get us in the building, but if the apartment is locked we’re gonna have to shoot our way in. That’s gonna attract ‘em to us. So we gotta be quick, in and out. Your gun loaded?”

She checks. “Yes.”

“Full clip?”

She checks. “Yes.”

“Extra ammo in your pocket?”

She checks. “Yes.”

“Safety off?”

She checks. “Yes.”

“If we get up there and they changed, you gonna be ready to pull the trigger if I can’t for some reason?” She gives a cold nod in the affirmative. Willy studies her.
Part of her wants to shoot ‘em, whether undead or alive
.
Her fear is only matched by her anger right now
. “Alright then. When you’re ready, pull up like we did last time. But ram some more with the car so they can’t move too fast with broken legs and all. And remember; if you shoot, get ‘em in the head.”

To Sheryl it feels like there are so many instructions. Lots of things to think about, to remember; how to load and use the gun, the keys in the car, the door closing, the head shots. It seems simple enough but she’s nervous, scared. She circles the lot several more times, running down cannibal after cannibal, immobilizing them.

“Yeah that’s good, that’s good,” Willy says, boosting her confidence. When the lot is basically motionless, they pull up to the rear entrance door and leap out of the car. Willy’s key is in the apartment door quickly and they enter. Sheryl closes the door behind them, quietly. But she accidentally took the car keys with her, through routine and habit.
Shit! I was supposed to leave them in the ignition
. She curses herself for the mistake, for not following Willy’s instructions.

Willy takes a sharp turn and they go through another door and into the foggy windowed stairwell. The daylight from outside illuminates the metal stairs, creating a shiny white surface. Their footsteps echo, as does the click of the door when Sheryl closes it behind them. Willy puts a finger to his lips motioning to Sheryl for silence. He listens intently to the sounds. With his shotgun in one hand, Willy reaches backward to silence the hook and strap on the rifle he has slung over his shoulder that rattles with each step.

There’s a faint grumbling from above, inside the stairwell. The building has five floors, but the sound could be from any one of them. They slowly ascend the stairs, step by step, guns drawn and aiming upward to the landing ahead. They reach the landing, turn, and quietly ascend to the second floor landing. The sounds grow louder, but they continue up. Another landing, another turn, another landing. They’re on the third floor. The noise sounds like it’s right on top of them; a fleshy chomping sound, coming from on the stairs leading to the fourth floor. Willy peeks through the glass window on the door into the third floor hallway. The coast is clear. He slowly turns the door handle until it clicks. Then suddenly the chomping sound stops. It’s dead silent in the stairwell. Willy has the door open. He motions for Sheryl to pass through into the hall but she’s frozen with fear, her eyes fixed on the stairway, her gun drawn, her breath quivering, and sweat beading on her forehead despite the cold. Willy nudges her and she breaks her gaze, following him through the door. She closes it behind her as quiet as she can. They move on.

The hall is dim. Their eyes play tricks on them, and they think they see the faint glowing eyes of the undead ahead of them, at the end of the hallway. With no electricity and no windows, the only light available is behind them, creeping through the stairwell door. It flickers as shadows pass behind it, breaking the rays of light. The beast that lurks within the stairwell stirs. Willy guides them as they quietly creep to the third door on the right. The buzzer reads 3G, just below the peep hole. He turns the doorknob slowly until it clicks open.
Lucky it was unlocked
. He cautiously opens the door and they both go inside.

A gentle breeze blows through the dark apartment from an open window somewhere, but not from the living room. Light barely gets in from the heavily curtained windows there. A small pile of clothing sits at the foot of the couch, and a trail of undergarments leads back toward the bedroom. Sheryl sees her husband’s shirt among them. She holds back the anger, the frustration. After all it’s just what she suspected.

Willy sweeps the living room, looking behind the couch, and Sheryl peeks over the countertops to check the kitchen. They turn toward the other rooms, where light trickles in from an open door at the end of the hall. Willy creeps up to the bathroom door and puts his ear up against it. He hears nothing, so they move toward the bedroom. The cold, gentle breeze blusters down the hallway toward them. The light ahead shifts and moves. Sheryl wonders if it’s them, or if it’s just the bedroom curtains blowing with the wind. Willy moves forward. They step quietly on the carpeted floor. When they reach the door Willy peeks his head around to see inside. He turns back to Sheryl with a finger over the mouth area of his mask, signaling quiet.

Then, in a heartbeat, he turns into the room and swings the butt of his shotgun around, using it like a club. Sheryl follows him into the room where she hears the meaty thwack of Willy’s gun crack the back of a head. A girl falls to the ground. Sheryl knows she’s one of them; she can see it in her eyes. But it doesn’t matter anyway, even if she’s still a human. What Sheryl does is more out of hatred than survival or self defense. Without hesitation she begins to kick her over and over. In the body, in the head. The girl growls and squirms, trying to grab and claw at anything she can. Sheryl tries to remain quiet but the anger is overwhelming. She stomps on her head, furiously grunting with each blow until finally there is no movement beneath her heel. When she lifts her foot a string of bloody goo stretches up, connecting the bottom of her sneaker to the mess of brain matter under it.

Then they hear pounding from outside the room, from the bathroom. Someone or something
is
inside, and is now trying to get out. Sheryl wonders if it might be her husband, still alive inside, hiding from his mistress. But the door isn’t locked; it locks from the inside and opens inward. She knows he's turned.