Blood Alley, Page 2

  “Pike, are you listening to me?” Captain Walter’s voice interrupted his thoughts.

  “What was that?” Romulus asked as they passed under the yellow tape strung across the entrance to the alleyway. He was amazed they still had yellow tape after all these years and what did it really matter? Most people were now tucked away, safe behind their closed doors.

  “I asked why you need all those weapons.”

  “Surely you jest, Walters?”

  With a shocking, high pitched whine, the sirens that had been blowing for the past twenty minutes abruptly cut off, leaving only their echoes in the alley, chased away by the frozen winds.

  “Morning, Captain!” one of the militia men standing around the bodies, greeted Walters as the two men approached.

  “Pawlowski,” the Captain returned with a barely perceivable nod of his head. “Situation report please.”

  Pawlowski stepped forward, the fat under his chin wobbled with his steps. “Well see here, Captain. Sometime early this morning, it appears that this young man,” he said pointing to one of the two corpses on the ground. “Was attacked by that there zombie,” he said pointing at the other corpse.

  Romulus stepped over to the body on the ground and leaned forward to inspect the body. The throat was torn open and blood had pooled out from the wound. At some point during the cold night, the blood had frozen and now the body was stuck to the ground. Romulus prodded the corpse with the toe of his boot.

  “Now you, stop that!” Pawlowski bleated. “That there is evidence. You can’t be contaminating the crime scene.”

  With a start, the eyes of the dead man popped open, revealing blank eyes. The pupils lost in a milky whiteness. A hiss escaped the creature’s mouth as it reached out with both hands for the men standing around.

  “Jesus H Christ!” Pawlowski shouted as he jumped back, probably moving faster than the fat man had ever moved in his life.

  In one fluid movement, Romulus reached behind his back, released the catch on his axe and brought the heavy blade down and around, smashing in the zombie’s forehead. The creature’s flailing movements stopped immediately.

  “Now it’s a zombie scene,” Romulus said as he wiped the axe blade on the zombie’s chest and returned the blade to his back.

  “Jesus H Christ!” Pawlowski repeated for a second time.

  “Get yourself together, Pawlowski. Finish your report,” Captain Walters said, a little irritation entering his voice.

  “As I was saying, Sir. This here young man came down the alleyway sometime around 2:00 AM and was attacked by that there zombie. The zombie proceeded to tear the man’s throat out with his teeth, while the man caved in the zombie’s head with that there board,” he said pointing to a bloody board lying on the ground next to the second figure.

  “And how do you estimate it to have been around 2:00 AM?” the Captain asked.

  “Well, you see that there man standing by officers Jones and Franklin?” he asked pointing to the other end of the alley. “Well, he lives across from the entrance of the alley and he says he was woke at 2:00 AM by someone screaming all bloody murder from down in this area, where we are standing. He says he yelled out his front door for them to shut up.”

  “Did he see anything?” Romulus chimed into the conversation.

  Pawlowski stared at Romulus for a second and then turned back to his captain. “Nah, he didn’t see nothing. Said it was all too dark for him. Besides he was just interested in getting back to sleep, when the screaming stopped he was done caring.”

  “Do you know either of the zombies?” Captain Walters continued.

  “That one there,” he said pointing at the newly deceased zombie. “The one with the axe hole in his head. Why that is Alex Wilkins, you know him and Conner Witt are as thick of thieves, don’t go nowhere without each other. Anyways, both Alex and Conner were over at the Shine House last night putting on a big one. I stopped by the bar myself last night to have a spot before heading home. Anyway, seems Alex had asked Emily Smith to marry him and she had said ‘yes’. The boys were having a good old time.”

  “And the other body?”

  “Seems I might know about him too,” the fat man replied nervously. “I was working the entrance gate couple days ago when he came to the gate looking to enter the city. He weren’t looking so good and we didn’t know him so we done locked him up in quarantine like the rule book says to.”

  “What is he doing loose and roaming the city? Quarantine is a minimum of five days.”

  “Well, Captain, I don’t rightly know. See, that was my last day working the gate, I just came off my weekend.”

  “Hold on a second,” Romulus interjected, holding up his hand. “What was it you just said?” he asked as his eyes roamed the ground.

  “I said that I just got off my weekend.”

  “No, before that. You said something about ‘go nowhere without each other’ and ‘thick as thieves’? If that is the case where is this Conner Witt? Why isn’t he here?”

  “How the hell would I know? I’m not his keeper. Captain who the hell is this guy?” Pawlowski asked.

  “He is a zombie hunter. The General sent him to help us out. Not that we need his help,” the Captain added. “Just answer his questions. Sooner we get this done the sooner we can get home. Looks like it is fixin to snow soon.”

  “Listen both of you,” Romulus commanded, regretting his decision to open his mouth. He too wanted to get this over with and get on with his contract. “There is no way this went down like you are saying, Pawlowski. There had to be a third person here.”

  “Maybe, you could be right. Could’ve been Conner Witt.”

  “There is no way that this guy could have beaten the crap out of the zombie with his throat torn out. Nor could the zombie have torn his throat out with his head bashed in like it is,” Romulus stated as he stepped over the zombie’s corpse. “Look here,” Romulus added pointing on the ground next to the body. “Footsteps in the blood. There had to be someone else here in the alley. If you are correct about Alex and Conner being best friends, my bet would be those footsteps belong to Conner.”

  “Well, I’ll be damned and fried in butter,” Pawlowski stated. “You sure are a regular detective, Mr. Zombie Hunter.”

  “Can it! Pawlowski,” Captain Walters said, reluctant to help out Romulus. “Any idea where Conner Witt might be?”

  “Well, he and Alex work at the brickworks, maybe he is there. The shift started about an hour ago. Also, his apartment is two blocks over. He and Alex lived in that building that used to be the old UPS Store.”

  Romulus cursed himself for pointing out the obvious. Sometimes he wondered at the randomness of those who survived the Apocalypse and those who did not. How this man could have missed the clues was beyond him.

  Now, however, with opening his mouth and pointing out the obvious he had delayed his exit from New Atlanta even longer. “Now what?” he asked aloud.

  “Now we divide and conquer,” Captain Walters replied. “Pawlowski, turn that man loose down there and then head over to quarantine. I need to know how that man got out of there two days early,” he said. He then turned to another militia man who had been quietly standing by the whole time. “Smith, head down to the brickworks and see if Witt is at work. We need to find this man ASAP.”

  “And us?” Romulus asked, already knowing the answer.

  “You and I, we are going to head over to the apartment and see if Conner is home.”

  IV

  Conner Witt was in pain, both physically and emotionally. He had spent almost his whole life with Alex and now his friend was gone. However, the pain from the loss of his best friend could not begin to compare to the pain that was racing through his body. Tendrils of the infection were spreading along his arteries and veins, spreading Freddy’s Disease throughout his body.

  He knew from the stories and literature that he did not have very long. The incubation period for the disease was somewhere between five to twenty fo
ur hours. He knew he had to figure something out fast, before it was too late and he turned into one of the Infected.

  Conner gazed across the darkened room, past the clothes scattered across the floor, towards the free standing fireplace in the corner. Thank God! There was no fire, he thought. He was burning up with a fever. He stood back up and started to shred off his clothes in an attempt to cool down. Standing up turned out to be a big mistake as his bowels clenched then loosened.

  He gagged at the smell coming from off his body. “Oh dear God, I’ve shit myself,” he mumbled as he dropped back down on the sofa, and then slipped further down to the floor curling up in the fetal position.

  Conner was having trouble remembering events that happened after he had been bit by the zombie. He remembered sprinting out of the alley, but after that things had become a blur. He knew that at one point during the early morning, he found himself standing in front of Emily Lawson’s house, his hand poised, ready to knock. He was going to tell her what had happened to Alex and that they were not going to be able to get married. He even thought, just for a second that might be good for him. Conner had always had a thing for Emily, but she belonged to Alex.

  But no, if he told Emily what had happened to Alex then he would have to tell her that he had been bitten, too. Then what would have happened? Would Emily have then raised the alarm and called the militia? Would she have turned him in?

  Conner had not waited to find out what her reaction would have been. For a second time that night, he sprinted off into the cold, dark streets of New Atlanta.

  Sunrise found Conner back home, safe in the apartment that he, until earlier that morning, had shared with Alex. He was having trouble figuring out what to do. He knew the right thing was to go to the militia, tell them about the attack, about the zombie and what had happened. But he couldn’t do that. Life was not fair. He didn’t do anything wrong. Maybe the militia men would just let him go? Maybe they would just walk him to the front gates and let him walk right out of the city into the forest that was growing outside the city walls.

  Yeah right, he thought. Maybe they would let him walk out the gate and then one of the guards would put a bullet through the back of his head, blowing his brains out before he could get ten steps beyond the wall. That’s what they did with the infected. They blew their heads off.

  No. There was no way he was going to turn himself into the militia. If he was going to go, he was going to go his way. He remembered a place on the south side of the town, where the guards were less common. He and Alex had climbed over the wall there a few years back, when they had wanted to go exploring. He could go there and climb the wall. He could go climb the wall and disappear into the forest, lay back against a nice tree and wait for the disease to claim him. Hell, becoming a zombie would be far better than having your brains blown out by one of the militia and then having them burn your body in a pit.

  A loud banging on his front door interrupted Conner’s thoughts. The banging went on for a few seconds then stopped. The banging was then repeated a second time, followed by a voice shouting through door. “Open up, Militia.”

  “Shit, shit, shit!” Conner whispered as he sat up. “They’ve already found me.”

  He got up, ran into the kitchen and grabbed a dirty, butcher knife that was sitting in the sink. Holding the knife up he started back towards the door. “Not taking me without a fight.”

  “What the fuck am I doing? They’ll shoot me in the back of the head. My life, my terms,” he said as he dropped the knife and ran to the back of the apartment, down the hallway and into Alex’s room that faced the back street. He paused long enough to make sure there was nobody out back, then slipped open the window and dropped the four feet to the ground below.

  He stopped long enough to make sure that nobody was watching and then sprinted off.

  Conner knew the right thing to do would be to turn himself into the militia. He really did not want to infect anyone else. He did not want to bring this on others, but there was nothing he could do, there was no cure for Freddy’s. Or was there? Hadn’t one of the guys at the brickworks been talking about the old witch who lived down by the river? What had he been saying? Didn’t the guy say the old witch had made some concoction of herbs and plants that cured a friend’s brother or something like that? Didn’t he say that you had to get the medicine from her within the first couple of hours before it had a chance to take over your whole body? Maybe, Conner thought. Maybe he still had time.

  Without hesitation, Conner Witt took off towards the river.

  V

  Odysseus Pawlowski had been with the militia for over ten years now. He found it to be an easy job with plenty of benefits not available to regular citizens of the apocalyptic world. Most of the time, he just had to stand around doing nothing but telling other people what to do. He was very good at that part of the job.

  Pawlowski hated coming to the quarantine building. Working quarantine was the one job in the militia he did not like pulling. Quarantine was a thankless job, the detainees hated being placed in quarantine and made the job miserable on the guards assigned to work the building. The only time he liked to work to job was when one of the female detainees became amorous and made the shift pleasurable.

  Now, Pawlowski stood outside quarantine, a one-story, cinder-block building with bars on its windows huddled beneath the outer walls of the city, trying to decide if he was actually going to go in and find out how the zombie got out or if he might just go back and tell Captain Walters that he didn’t find anything.

  Duty eventually took over and Pawlowski walked up to the steel door and went into the building. The guard who normally sat at a tiny desk in the reception area was not at his post and the door leading into the cell block was wide open. The usual chatter amongst the detainees as they talked was also missing.

  Pawlowski walked up to the open doorway, drew his revolver, and peered down the dark hallway. Eight doors lined the hallway four to a side facing each other. The doors were made of metal and had a small viewing port at eye level that could be opened and closed to see inside the cell. Another latch at the base of the door allowed the guards to slide food through to the people inside the cell. At the far end of the hallway was a ninth door which opened into the guard’s quarters and kitchen area.

  As Pawlowski’s eyes adjusted to the hallway’s darkness, he noticed the last door on the right stood open, where it should have been closed.

  “Hello,” he called out. “Anyone here?” Pawlowski walked down the hall, making sure he did not miss anything as he made his way to the first door on the right. He slid open the viewing port and looked into the cell. Darkness greeted his eyes. He reached down and plucked the flashlight from his belt and shined the beam into the small cell. The only thing in the room was a free standing toilet and two made up cots, nothing else stirred in the room.

  Pawlowski crossed the hall to the door facing the room he had just inspected and threw back the view port and peered inside. The cell was just as empty as the first one had been.

  When he reached the third door, Pawlowski heard movement behind the door, a shuffling sound. He reached up and slid the hatch back on the door. He peered in to the room and could once again only see darkness, but the room smelled foul, almost dead. He brought the flashlight up and shined the beam through the opening in the door.

  The room was a mess. Both cots had been turned over, the sheets and blankets torn off. On the wall in what could have been blood or feces was written “Help Me”. Pawlowski holstered his revolver, reached down and tried the door. Jiggling the handle, he was satisfied the door was still locked; one of the guards would have the keys. Movement in the corner, left of the door, caught his attention from within the room. He tried to shine the flashlight’s beam over into the corner but could not get enough of an angle to illuminate the area.

  “Hello,” Pawlowski called out, barely above a whisper. “Hello? Anyone in there?” he turned his head and pressed his eye against the view
port to get a better look into the room.

  Bloody teeth filled his view as a zombie stepped up to the door, the creature’s fetid breath washed over Pawlowski’s face, the smell making him gag. He fell back from the door and dropped the flashlight to the floor. The flashlight cut out as it struck the concrete and extinguished all light in the hallway.

  “Jesus fucking Christ,” he exclaimed as he fell onto the door across the hallway from the zombie’s cell. He grabbed his gun from its holster and pointed it at the door with both hands. “Back the fuck off.”

  A bang erupted from the door he leaned against as something hit it from the other side. Something moaned and growled from the other side of the locked door. Pawlowski retrieved the flashlight from the floor and knocked it against his thigh a few times to get it to work. He stood up and opened the port on the other door and found a second zombie trying to get at him from the small hole in the door. He slammed the port shut, cutting the creature off and moved to close the other door’s viewing port.

  Four more doors remained in the hallway; he noticed the last door on the right was wide open. He crept up to the open door, drawn gun and flashlight pointed at the opening. He choked at the smell from the room, rotted meat combined with the coppery, metallic smell of blood.

  “Hello, anyone in there?” he called once again as he halted just outside the door, as he waited for a response. Nothing, no response came back to him. He counted to ten in his head, pausing after each number, as he tried to take as much time as he could before entered the cell. Finally, not able to waste any more time, he rushed through the open door.

  His flashlight played around the cell walls as he tripped across something inside the open door. He fell face first, his right cheek bounced off the floor as he struck the concrete. The air rushed from his lungs and the flashlight rolled from his grasped to crash into one of the legs from the cot. The beam of the light spun around the room as the flashlight twirled on the floor making him feel sick from its erratic movement around the room.