The NEXT Apocalypse (Book 2): AFTER Life: Purgatory Page 4

  Only a moment passed before the woman called for Dr. White to report the ER again, adding, “Dr. White to the Chrysanthemum Room.”

  A young nurse hurried down the hallway and beckoned to the big cop. “Can you help out in the ER? They just called Code White, violent patient.”

  I wondered what the code would be if they actually had a doctor named White.

  “You don’t think hospital security can handle it?” Don asked.

  “Not when they use ‘chrysanthemum.’ There is no such room. I’ve rarely heard that code actually used and I’ve worked here eight years. It means staff are injured.” The nurse looked at the coffee cup in his hand meaningfully. Her face told me she was thinking: You’re not doing anything useful up here, anyway. “Could you please check it out?”

  He looked to the cop at my side. “All good here, Shelly?”

  She looked at me, almost amused. “Sure. ETF is strapped in tight, Don. Unless his illness gives him magic powers, we’re fine.”

  “Yeah, he doesn’t look like no Penn and Teller to me.”

  “Go.”

  The cop nodded and hurried away. His retreating footfalls sounded heavy. By the look of him, he weighed maybe 260 pounds. By the smell that wafted away in the air conditioned air after he left, I guessed something was wrong with him. I had an intuition that, though he’d make a good meal, I shouldn’t eat his liver.

  I wondered where that thought came from. Funny, until I became the observer of events instead of a participant, I had never wondered where thoughts came from. Trapped in my body and doing things at the whim of a brain parasite, Time itself seemed to slow down and stretch out. I had lots of time to notice things and think about them. If this continued, I was in for a boring existence. What was I supposed to do if I couldn’t do anything? Is this what coma patients did all day? Think about what to think about?

  Shelly came closer to stare in my eyes.

  I could still smell the fear. She wasn’t particularly afraid of me in that moment but the screams outside (and coming inside) sped her heartbeat. Bravery doesn’t mean fear is not felt. It means we experience fear but do what needs to done. At that moment, Shelly was more curious than she was afraid.

  “Hey. Mr. Monster. Don’s right, you don’t look like a magician. You don’t look like anything special … but … how come you aren’t caterwauling and growling like the rest of the crazies? You’re not looking so wild now. When I pepper sprayed you, did the doggie get disciplined? You don’t want to kill me anymore? You sure tried hard in the back of that van.”

  I stared back. Hers was a good question. I wanted to think the parasites infesting my brain decided to go away and find someone else to make their puppet. That wasn’t the answer, though. As soon as I awoke, I’d tested the straps at my wrists. There was little chance of escape and, somehow, the Picasso strain knew better than to try.

  The idea that a brain parasite could make decisions seemed ridiculous at first. However, the zombies seemed to have a knack for going after weaknesses. Predators go for the weakest and easiest kill of any herd. I didn’t give Picasso credit for much intelligence but there was something deeper going on. I remembered an old movie title: Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill! Apparently, the brain parasites were capable of more nuance than a Russ Meyer film from 1965.

  Then I remembered the woman who attacked Patrick Davis in the Box. She didn’t have the mass to take Patrick down in a straight tackle but she had not tried that. She’d moved with the grace of a gymnast, diving over him and wrenching the hood from his biohazard suit. She made him vulnerable to the best attack she could mount. She’d used strategy to bite his face and take his eyes. Would a wild dog be that clever? What had Hamish unleashed on us?

  Strapped to a gurney, maybe I was the luckiest of the afflicted. I’d chewed on a couple of people who were already dead. I hadn’t killed a human unless I counted Mac, but the ETF Staff Sergeant had sent me on a suicide mission into the Box. Maybe I should have felt bad about that but I didn’t. I’d perforated his protective suit with a bullet so the bastard could share my fate. The bio-weapon had already gone airborne. If I hadn’t got him, someone else probably would have.

  Now that I was stuck in a hospital, maybe there was a chance I could be cured. Were brain parasites operable? Would chemotherapy rid me of Hamish’s “little beasties?” Brain surgery? A good whack to the head?

  But no brilliant brain surgeon was coming to save me. The doctors were downstairs, getting eaten.

  Chapter 8

  CHLOE

  Thomas broke into a sweat as if he had just returned from a long run on a humid day. “What got out exactly?”

  “Something bad.”

  “But what’s it do?”

  “Imagine spending every minute we’re alive expecting to be attacked.”

  “So … like Twitter? More weaponized?”

  “Not funny, Chloe.”

  “It was a little funny.”

  “If we don’t get on top of this, we’ll lose everything. I’m talking about a trip back to the Dark Ages, trying to live off cabbage soup and tears.”

  “How?”

  “It’s biological kill tech with a potential casualty ratio on a level of The Walking Dead.”

  I pulled a chair toward me and sat down, taking a moment to gather my thoughts. Thomas knelt beside me. “It’s spreading. We have to get ahead of it. I need you to come back with me to Toronto.”

  “So … no Foo Fighters tonight?”

  “I’m afraid not.”

  “You know what bothers me most about the zombie apocalypse?” I asked. “Say a mysterious comet goes over or a witch’s curse is unleashed or something equally stupid. In all those stories, people forget to lie down when they die and get hungry for brains. But what about the dead who get trapped in their graves? That’s a lot of poor old dead grandmothers banging and clawing at the inside of their coffins in the dark, isn’t it? Chew on that visual for a full minute and you’ll soon feel the need to pee while you’re crying. I kind of feel that urge now. What were you thinking even trying to put something like that together, Thomas? Some weapons are too dangerous to even think about and you were manufacturing one?”

  “Chloe, what’s done is done. Some of the stuff they were working on at Echidna can turn people into cannibals. It’s the ECPSD project.”

  “I’m gonna need the English subtitles.”

  “Enemy Combatant Pacification Strategic Defense.”

  “You know military applications are not my thing. You know that. Whenever you guys talk defense, you really mean offense, as in, offense to all that’s holy. It’s in my contract that I will not participate in weapons development. You go. Fix it. I’ll try to get you an autograph from Dave Grohl — ”

  “The Echidna team is down. I need your brains, Chloe. We’re forming a new ERG to work the problem.”

  “ERG?”

  “Emergency Response Group.”

  “What is it with you guys and acronyms? Does it make you feel better? More official and legit or something?”

  “Chloe, sometimes your moods are — ”

  “Stormy? Unpredictable?”

  “Yeah, you’re positively meteorological. For Christ’s sake! I know you don’t have a healthy respect for hierarchy but I am your boss— ”

  “Doug Hannah from Nyx seems like a friendly billionaire. I betcha I could have a new job about a minute from now. Wanna bet?”

  Thomas stared at me for a cold moment. Then the truth bubbled up. “Echidna is using AFTER.”

  “What?”

  “Your research belongs to the company, Chloe. Don’t get your back up about this — ”

  “My back is up and my ass is out of joint, Thomas. What exactly did you do with my baby?”

  He took a deep breath. “The agents we use to make monsters were enhanced with the help of your nanites.”

  “Agents?”

  “Parasites.”

  “You enhanced parasites?”

  “Enh
anced them, weaponized them. The distinction is mostly semantic.”

  I felt like I’d swallowed ice cubes. “What kind of parasites did you weaponize, Thomas?”

  “Brain parasites.”

  I gasped. “As in, the opposite of what I was put on Earth to do.”

  “The weapons division paid for your new electron microscope. You’re a genius, Chloe, but you’re not as good at cost-benefit analysis as you think you are. Forget the bio-weapon aspect. It’s a disease and you’re still in the curing business. Are you in or out because we need a cure.”

  “Zombie apocalypse, huh?” I took a deep breath and let it out slowly through my teeth. “What’s the vector?”

  “Airborne.”

  Despite Aruba’s heat, my feet and hands suddenly went cold.

  “I don’t have all the data yet, of course, but — ”

  “Any good news?”

  “They have a subject in custody. He seems to have contracted the parasite, one of the SWAT guys. They’re holding him in an isolation unit at St. Mike’s. We’ll transfer the patient to a company containment lab in Aurora. I’ve got to call Ottawa, Washington, Atlanta, the insurance company, the Board … oh, my lord, it’s a mess.”

  “Anything else I should know?”

  “That’s pretty much it except it goes without saying this exposes the company to a ton of liability issues. This is all confidential.”

  “Yeah, yeah, I get the top secret bit. We’re not even having this conversation right now, are we? But, Thomas, if I save the world, I’m gonna want the world to know. If I don’t save it, I want you to get the blame.”

  “Scold me on the flight, if you want. I don’t have time for it now. They’re calling me back with more numbers in — ” He checked the time on his phone. “Twenty-one minutes. We should be wheels up in thirty. So? In or out?”

  “Go. I’ll meet you at the car.”

  “Leave your bags. We don’t have time to — ”

  “Get them to bring a car around, then. I’ll be right there. If this is the end of the world, I’ve got one last thing I have to do for myself first.”

  I pushed Thomas toward the door and rushed back to the bar. I waved to the handsome young bartender with slicked back hair and neat beard. “What’s the most expensive white wine you have back there?”

  He didn’t hesitate. “Coche-Dury Corton-Charlemagne Grand Cru.”

  “That was quick.”

  “It’s a twenty-three hundred dollar bottle of white, Madam, more than my mother and father made in their lifetimes.” He brought out the bottle and held it up for me to see the label.

  “I’ll need the whole bottle.”

  “From which company are you, Madam?”

  I gave him a huge smile. “Put this one on Mr. Cavanaugh’s tab, from Nyx Management. He’s right over there by the wall. He asked me to bring it to him. See? The thin shit in the shiny suit? Thin shit in the shiny suit. Thin shit in the shiny suit. Say that five times fast, I dare you.”

  The bartender chuckled. “I have met Mr. Cavanaugh. I understand what you mean about him.”

  “Can you pop the cork on that bad boy, please?”

  The bartender did as I asked and offered me a glass. I did not sip it. I knocked it back fast. It tasted okay.

  The bartender quirked an eyebrow. “Miss? Would you prefer a silver tray and more glasses for your friends?”

  I shook my head. “No, thanks. I’ve got something to do that I just put up on my vision board.” I scooped up the bottle before stalking back to Hannah and Cavanaugh.

  “Doug? I see your glass is empty. It’s the finest wine they have on hand.”

  “Uh, thank you, Chloe.”

  I poured Hannah a generous amount. “I’ve got to go back to Toronto. I’ve just discovered Thomas stabbed me in the back and then in the chest. What I’m saying is, I have to go off and save the world now. If we live through this, I’ll be sending you my resume.”

  “Oh. Ah.” Hannah mulled this for a moment before replying, “If you save the world, I’ll certainly look forward to that job interview.”

  Cavanaugh held out his empty glass. “What’s this bullshit, wine girl?”

  “It could be the world’s end,” I said. “If that’s the case, my thinking is we shouldn’t leave anything undone.” I reached for his belt and took the buckle in my fist. “Stand up, Mike. I’m so sorry I didn’t know who you were before.”

  Cavanaugh gave me a reptilian smile as I pulled him to his feet. “You looking for a job from me, too? Maybe you should give me a job — ”

  I yanked the buckle toward me and shoved the upturned bottle of wine down his pants. He let out a shriek as he tried to extricate the bottle. Too late. The cold wine poured out. He looked very much like he’d pissed himself.

  The party stopped. Every eye turned to watch us. People snatched up their phones to take video. He was still cursing as I walked away. “Michael Cavanaugh from Nyx, everybody! Colossal douche! Hashtag that on Instagram! ” I shouted grandly. “Congratulations, Mike! Everybody will remember you now! Drink up, everyone! And, tonight, do what you always wanted to do! It’s probably the end of the world, anyway!”

  On my way out, the young bartender gave me a big grin and a thumbs-up.

  Chapter 9

  DANIEL

  I heard the commotion in the stairway. Feet pounded up the steps. When people run scared, they’re lighter on their feet and push off from their toes. Angry and hungry people hit the ground hard with their heels. I’d chased people down alleys occasionally. I’d never noticed that distinction before.

  Since I was vulnerable and tied to the gurney, I wondered if my fellow cannibals would attack me first. My heart did not race. I guessed they wouldn’t come for me. What were the rules? It wasn’t professional courtesy. It was as if the parasites we carried in our skulls were on a mission to feed but also to make more of themselves as quickly as possible. Poor Shelly Priyat. There I was, an easy zombie buffet, but they would chase her, take her down and eat her alive.

  My ETF team brought in an American fugitive once, a serial killer named Grant Bray. He’d slipped across the border at Port Huron unrecognized. However, a Union Station ticket taker for VIA rail recognized him from a poster and called police.

  Bray was a cannibal killer who’d eluded capture for years because, as a long-haul trucker, he never stayed in one place long. He seemed to strike on impulse when opportunities presented themselves. His targets were usually hitchhikers, men and women alike. Sometimes he killed kids. He didn’t see people as people, only targets. He might have murdered for years more but we caught a lucky break. One of his intended victims was a young woman on a lonely road in Indiana. When he attacked her, she smashed a Coke bottle and ground the jagged ends into his face.

  When Bray bought a ticket for Montreal, the ragged bandage on his cheek tipped off the VIA Rail employee. As I watched him in a crowded waiting area, the cannibal killer sat quietly with a backpack between his feet. He read a Globe & Mail and sipped coffee, just another traveler, unremarkable except for the bandage on his face. I imagined him out in the world, driving past public parks, past schools, picking up trusting strangers. The half of his face that was undamaged could be any face in a crowd. He wasn’t memorable for being particularly handsome or ugly. The woman who got away said he was perfectly nice until the moment he tried to strangle her with an electrical cord he kept by the driver’s seat.

  We wanted to take him down in a tight, controlled space with only one exit so we delayed the train. We waited for him to go to the bathroom. When biology finally made its demand, I followed him in and waited until he was in a toilet stall. Two of us quietly guided a couple of innocent bystanders away from the urinals. We waited for him to finish his shit. When Bray emerged, he found me in plainclothes. The rest of the team waited for him in full tactical gear.

  I’ll never forget how casual he was as he raised his hands. “Hi, guys. What’s up? It’s about time.”

  It
was in that moment I understood how banal violent sociopaths can appear. He looked so normal. No scary face tattoos or weird behavior that would suggest he was a sadistic killer who fried up body parts as a grisly hobby. His smile was broad and his manner amiable. No wonder hitchhikers felt comfortable climbing into his cab. His M.O. was to offer them a spiked drink — usually a Coke or a Red Bull. Later, the victim would wake up in the back of his truck with their feet and hands zip tied. Steve Taylor pulled a sandwich bag of fingers and toes from Bray’s backpack. The killer laughed and told us he always began with the ears.

  Call it evil or label it the work of a brain gone bad, that was one of my most frightening days on the Emergency Task Force. It wasn’t the fingers and toes that kept me awake all that night. It was how ordinary Grant Bray seemed. He could have been anybody’s brother, son or husband. It was easier to picture motorcycle gangs and psychos with lots of prison tattoos as The Big Bad. If Grant Bray could pass for a normal and decent human being, another person like him could be anywhere. In any mall, coffee shop or home, the one you trust handing you a Coke could be another killer.

  I told myself not to become paranoid, but of course, I did. Seeing the worst in people every day is enough to make anyone cynical. Now, as I lay there under guard, it occurred to me that life was about to get much simpler. No one would have to watch out for killers coming from out of the shadows. We zombies announce we’re coming with shrieks and growls. Anybody could be a munching murderer. You know you’re close to the end of the world when the extraordinary becomes so ordinary.

  Even in the apocalypse, though, not all dangers barreling at the uninfected are quite so obvious. In the case of Constable Don Roberts, he staggered into my hospital room bleeding from the chin, forearm and neck.

  Shelly ran to him, “Don? Don! What happened?”

  “I pulled some people off some other people and no one was grateful. I ended up hitting more people just to get out of there. Some of them hit back. It’s crazy down there,” he panted. “The whole ER has gone nuts. It wasn’t even the patients. A doctor and a nurse tried to bite me.”