“Don’t worry. I doubt they are looking very hard for people trying to sneak IN to the infected area,” replied John.
As if on cue, the train slowly rolled by a man in camo gear. Emma supposed that she could see better in the low light than he could - thanks to her recently improved blue tinged eyesight - but really even if he was similarly equipped he would not have spotted the duo. He didn’t look their way once – his gaze was affixed in the distance to where their train was laboriously heading.
“Wait,” answered Emma, as they left the guard in the middle distance. “If they aren’t looking for people trying to break in to the infected area hence our easy infiltration then how the fuck are we getting back out again?”
Silence.
“I didn’t think that far ahead,” answered John honestly.
“Fuck me,” answered Emma honestly, waiting for the train to pass fully by the bridge before hopping off and breaking in to a jog.
Looking around as they ate up the distance until the mall, Emma was instantly struck by how quiet the streets were.
“Where do you think everyone went to?” she breathlessly panted as they jogged down the deserted streets.
“I dunno,” answered John calmly as he ran beside her, about as winded as someone taking a leisurely Sunday stroll.
This is downtown Boston she thought to herself and it is.. she looked up at a billboard flashing the time only 8:30PM. Where are all the people?
Thinking about it, she supposed not many people actually lived in this area – in all likelihood most everyone got out when the attack happened, or at least before they started erecting barricades.
It is funny, but this might be the safest part of the city she continued inside her mind lower population density, plenty of very secure buildings. She thought to the couple of times she had lost control and became a monster – did she have the presence of mind in that basic state to do things like operate elevators?
Possibly.
So find some multistory building, shut down power to the elevators and blockade the stairs then. It sounded like as good of a plan as any to Emma. Until I run out of Serotonin and go mad myself of course she reminded herself.
Waiting was not an option for her; it would never be an option. From now on, if she wasn’t pressing forward she was slipping backwards – possibly into madness.
“We’re here,” John stated, slowing down and giving Emma a start. She had been so enmeshed inside her head that she had no idea how much distance they had travelled.
John walked up to the door of the mall, idly throwing aside a streamer of police tape. For a second, as it fluttered down to the ground Emma was struck by how much it looked like a streamer from a parade - some welcoming celebration, where life and community were honored. Looking around at the dead streets, Emma supposed no-one would be partying here anytime soon.
Looking back, she saw John winding up to bash his shoulder into the glass of the door.
“Whoa Stop!” she yelled, too loud. Her voice echoed in the streets. “Stop,” she reiterated more quietly.
“What? It is locked” he answered with a smile. Emma instantly got the feeling that breaking into a mall was some kind of bucket list item for the weird man.
“Key,” she answered simply, presenting a simple key from one of her pockets. “I swiped it earlier, when everyone was investigating the scene.”
“Oh… “ replied John sadly “yeah I guess that works too. A lot more subtle certainly.”
Opening the door slowly, Emma and John were instantly hit by a coppery smell. All the bodies had been removed but the blood was everywhere and it had settled to give off the slightly acrid smell of an old tomb.
“Home sweet home,” said John, smiling and walking inside.
“You’re weird, man,” replied Emma, but she followed him anyway.
Emma wouldn’t have said the mall was worse without the bodies but neither would she have said it was better, bright swishes of red made the scene look like a painting that she just couldn’t understand. She heard a thunk thunk thunk of a door and looked up with a start.
“Seriously?” asked John, seemingly to himself before coming back into view. He had discovered the pay bathrooms.
“Do you have a token?” asked John, Emma merely shook her head in the negative.
“Fuck it,” John replied thoughtfully and went back around the corner. A second later a crash announced he had converted the washroom into a more free-for-use model.
Looking down at the blood, Emma tried her best to get in the zone like she had witnessed Dan do when performing autopsies. Try and pick out any details that didn’t fit in this scene. She tried to imagine scenarios – remembering the footage from earlier, she couldn’t easily identify any obvious target which was her first thought, that this was a focused attack made to look like mass murder.
She walked around the closest blood spatter. Was it a religious thing? A survival thing? Did he just like killing? Emma wouldn’t be the least bit surprised if the last was true.
“I did them a favor, the door was bent I kid you not. At least now they can claim it on insurance and get something that doesn’t look like it was made out of cardboard.”
It was at that point that a part of her hindbrain that had raised a tremulous red flag earlier when looking at the scene with Dan meekly managed to make its presence known.
“Wait what?” she asked, brightly.
“Urgh I know, how the hell does the top half of a door bend like that even?” he answered, taking her intelligent inquiry for interest in the door situation as presented a few minutes ago.
“Not that you idiot,” she answered, jogging over to the Dunkin Donuts whose bent metal shutters she had noticed earlier, thinking it was done by looters after the fact.
“You said insurance,” she reiterated “like no-one would pay attention to the door because the insurance would cover it blindly.”
Moving the broken metal Emma found she could now slide over the counter of the Dunkin Donuts and wriggle beneath the bars.
“Do you think the same applies to looting?” she asked, moving over to the cash register. It had been pried open and emptied.
“Ohhhh yeah I see what you are saying,” he replied “Yeah my guess is they would just pay. I can’t imagine the police would spend much time trying to solve the identity of the Dunkin Donuts bandit, especially during an emergency.”
“That’s it then,” said Emma, wriggling back beneath the shutters and to freedom. “Then that is why Steve perpetrated this massacre – to mask the robbery.”
She looked around the room and suddenly the world opened around her, as she saw the whole plan unfold. “And it was a test. Seventeen people. Seventeen people died for the contents of a donut shop register.” Emma was stunned at the callousness, what cost a human life? Twenty dollars each? If that?
“Wow,” answered John simply “If Steve would kill that many for a cash register, I wonder how many he would shuffle off to take a bank vault?”
“I don’t think numbers matter to him very much,” replied Emma grimly.
“Except maybe the ones on the bills,” replied John.
“Yes,” answered Emma, walking out of the mall. “So his next target will probably be somewhere with a lot of people and banks.”
“I am not sure that narrows it down enough,” replied John, following her.
Emma was listening. A noise in the distance reminded her of a moment from her childhood when she held a large shell to her ear, and listened for a full minute to the sound of waves. Strange that now, standing in downtown Boston with a man who infected her with a deadly virus she would be hearing the same rushing noise. It ebbed and flowed just like the distant roaring of the ocean.
“Then maybe,” said Emma as she took off running, identifying this noise at last “we should just follow the sound of yelling.”
Chapter 17
Channel 7 WHDH Urgent News Upd
ate
Armed forces have been summoned to the scene of a recent riot in a historic downtown area of Boston. Citizens have been advised to clear the area as we have been advised the National Guard have been authorized to use deadly force against the rioters.
Initial outrage against this military action was forestalled when a deputy from the mayor’s office leaked the riots were being investigated by the Center for Disease Control - or CDC – leading to speculation by analysts that the rioters are a danger to the community at large. All inquiries have been forwarded to National Guard liaison Amy Bishop but she has as of right now declined further comment. The office of the Mayor has also declined further speculation on the nature of this latest scene of violence or any preceding events.
A curfew has been issued and all citizens are compelled to stay indoors. Individuals without appropriate credentials found outside will be summarily incarcerated pending evaluation by CDC officials.
More updates as they become available.
Having heard a summary of her lack of rights, delivered by military-grade speaker to the crowd in downtown Boston, Emma rocked back on her heels. So the end of the world begins on a Thursday she thought to herself. Secretly this confirmed several long held beliefs about the day in general. Pretending to be Friday but still entrenched in the week, she had long thought of it as the most duplicitous of days. Most people’s money would be on the start of the week, Emma would bet. Monday and Tuesday have a different deal though; their job was to be a shit sandwich dedicated to maintaining the soul crushing status quo, not breaking it.
“What tests do you think the CDC will be performing on anyone unlucky enough to be caught,” she wondered aloud.
“At a guess, dissection. But hey, what do I know? If they haul us in, maybe they will make you minister of Zombie defense and appoint me as the next pope. Who knows how government works?”
“I didn’t know you were catholic.”
“Never said I would be a good pope,” John answered, digging in the satchel that he kept buried under his right arm.
“Binoculars, really?” Emma asked incredulously as John produced a pair. Emma was not a great judge of binocular quality but she would bet the catalog selling them had once described them using terminology that implied edginess - they had little bits of blue trim on them and reminded her vaguely of a stingray. Describing a set of binoculars as edgy was probably one among countless reasons why she was not currently interested in becoming a judge of these things.
“What? Too dorky?” he answered, suddenly looking defensive.
“No, no it’s fine. Just didn’t take you for someone who owned binoculars is all. Especially ones with blue trim on them.” She responded.
“The blue bits are lighter than water,” he said, looking into them once more and focusing on the street below. “Makes them float.”
“Oh? Do you have a boat?” Emma couldn’t help but be a little impressed.
“No. But if I ever get a boat, you can believe I will not be losing my binoculars overboard. Take a look at this.”
Emma shuffled slowly towards the edge of the building – they were on the belfry of the Old North Church, a historic building 5 blocks away from the mall they had revisited earlier. Getting in had been ridiculously easy. The convenience had saddened a small part of Emma - the mousey her from the recent past - at the deplorable lack of security on a historic building. The fact that two characters such as herself and John could just walk in the unattended door and hop the two foot barricade nominally barring entrance to the winding spiraling set of steps leading to the room and other non-public places deserved a sharp letter.
She took another slow step forward; just enough to put her within arm’s reach of John and his ridiculous floatie binoculars.
It’s odd Emma thought I jumped through a fourth story window not a week ago. Without a stream of near-death induced adrenalin, she seemed unable to reproduce the same level of daring.
Emma reached out and carefully took the binoculars from her fellow Zombie, who handed them over with a smile at her timidity. Focusing on the large gathering in front of the East bridge – only a couple of blocks distant – it didn’t take Emma long to determine the cause of the ruckus.
Here was a sizable chunk of the North End and Chinatown population, trying to get out from a section of the city where confirmed attacks had taken place. For their good sense, they were rewarded with a military barricade in front of the bridge denying passage to all comers.
Logically, Emma could understand the point of trying to keep her virus contained. Witnessing this throng of people, all in a perilous position, Emma was struck by the lives behind the statistic. 5% losses sound acceptable when talking about a natural disaster. That is, until she stood here on the ledge, watching them milling about, trying to figure out what to do next. These people knew on some level that they had been deemed expendable and it was tearing at the collective psyches. Kids were crying, parents holding, angry young men arguing. In all the sound officially qualified as bedlam. An uncharitable part of Emma’s mind qualified it as bleating but she corrected herself – these people were trying to protect their humanity for once rather than act like the sheep they were for the other 99% of their lives.
To their credit, the military men were not treating the teaming mass like the enemy – they were in fact traversing the crowd and helping where they could. Despite the apparent kindness, the barricade still stood like an insurmountable monument – it painted the concern as a half-truth.
“So should we go back, keep a watch on the banks?” asked John.
“I don’t think he will make a move against them now – look at that,” answered Emma and pointed to a patrol of ten soldiers heading up the street. “He never makes a move unless he has numbers and a strong position,” she added.
“So … we win?” asked John, confused.
“So,” replied Emma, not unkindly, turning John’s head to look at the huge crowd of people in the floodlit square “He will attempt to make another distraction.”
“Should we tell someone?” John countered, sounding unsure.
Emma lifted an imaginary phone to her ear and put an index finger out to John, signifying for him to hold for this deeply important imaginary call.
“Hello, government? This is Emma. Some local thug named Steve Kerchak is going to try and infect mmm,” she pretended to count the crowd “a thousand or so people to commit a bank robbery – can you find him in a group that large and detain him please? How do I know all this? Because I gave him the virus, silly!” She then hung up her invisi-phone.
She turned back to John, a grin on her face.
“Is that how you pictured the exchange going?” she asked him.
“Not exactly. So what do we do then?” he asked, frustrated with the choices.
“We wait,” Emma answered “and maybe take turns getting some sleep.”
“Bagsie first sleep,” answered John immediately, to a mental dammit from the exhausted Emma. With a smile on his face he settled back against the wooden building and closed his eyes.
* * * * *
Seven hours and one turn for an uncomfortable 3 hours of sleep later, Emma was idly scanning the crowds in the pre-dawn light with the stupid floating binoculars. This put her in the perfect position to a) be feeling grumpy and b) see trouble as it started. And of course, it started with Steve.
Hearing a scream above the din, Emma focused in on a man sinking to his knees. She instantly kicked John awake.
Behind the man, even in the low light she could see the villain Steve – the man whose background evil she had empowered with the force of her virus. Switching quickly back to the downed man she had no doubt he had been bitten and that the families sitting near him were in immediate danger.
Making an instantaneous decision, Emma damned her brain for being afraid of heights and with only slight difficulty stood up.
“HEY!” she yelled as lo
ud as she could, waving her arms. Miraculously, she was heard above the other noises, several faces turning upwards towards her – including a couple of men in military uniforms.
“INFECTION!” she yelled, pointing down at the unfortunate man shaking uncontrollably on the ground. People around him, were grabbed and pulled backwards and one civic minded citizen stepped forward and shot the unfortunate infected man in the head. Emma sure hoped she had been right in her diagnosis – apparently the Boston crowd were disinclined to allow second opinions.
Sweeping back across the crowd, Emma was instantly disheartened. Seeing three widening circles at different places in the crowd she didn’t need the smattering of small arms fire to tell her what had happened. Steve had outplayed her again, spreading out his lackeys and coordinating the attack so that the chances of stopping the infected would be lessened.
She wordlessly handed the binoculars to John, who was peering into the crowd with groggy eyes from past her shoulder. He took in everything for a full minute before turning to her.
“We should probably go,” was his professional assessment of the scene below. Emma nodded, defeated. Taking a last look over the crowd with just her naked eyeballs, Emma could see pandemonium beginning. Riot shields had been deployed and gunfire was continuing from within the ranks of the mob. All these brave people – military and civilian alike – were facing the same problem, however, the enemy was all around them. Military men were falling back to the barricade, protected from an increasing number of snapping teeth and clawing hands from the cover of the thin plastic. Some of the worst offenders were rammed and beaten when down on the ground – tactically this proved a very effective move as the beaten creatures would then prove as a new focus for the growing number of monsters – they would turn and set upon them, which further covered the retreat of the national guardsmen.
The Zombies were in a feeding frenzy – they were tackling and biting the closest people only to be distracted by another potential victim. The infection was spreading like wildfire – thanks in no small part to Zombies coughing continually, slicking the crowds with their infected blood.
The pavement was red and slowly undulating as so many bodies groaned, writhed in agony or fed on those less fortunate. So many victims would descend into madness, their eyes dulled, and wake sometime later with the fresh blood of their family caked around their lips.