[Posted by Ted H]
"It's like Walking Dead, if that show had zombies in it" has become my elevator pitch for this novel...
Current status of my 2014 NaNoWriMo: 37,036 / 50,000 (12,964 words to go!)
Current pace has me writing my 50,000ths word on: November 29th
Joooooin us!
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[Race for Safe Haven - Bar Fight]
The next destination was the only
one Rhett cared about; the bar. Instead of his usual spot in the back of the
lot, Rhett parked right by the front in case he needed to get out in a hurry.
He pulled out the handgun and ejected the magazine to count the bullets inside.
"Thirteen," he said to himself after counting "Plus one in the
chamber." He loaded the gun and got out of the car. As useless as he
suspected the gun to be, losing track of how many bullets he had would be
stupid in its own right.
The bars front door was
slightly ajar but otherwise everything seemed normal, so Rhett readied the gun
low as he approached. He swung the door out of the way with his foot and peered
inside, his eyes trying to adjust to the dark interior. He stuck close to the
wall as he entered and took in the scene.
The bar was trashed. Tables
were overturned, broken glass was everywhere and large gunshot holes riddled
the walls. Strewn about were four bodies, none of them breathing, all with some
sort of gunshot damage to their head. "Oh my God," Rhett said as he
cautiously approached the nearest body. They were lying on their back with
their mouth open and full of something bloody, Rhett assuming it to be a chunk
of someone else's flesh. There were chunks of flesh missing all over the body,
something Rhett was getting tired of seeing.
A bloody arm rose up from
behind the bar and slammed down. Rhett jumped back and watched as a figure
steadied itself on the bar as it rose up to regard him. "Aw man,"
Rhett said as he recognized the bartender from last night, now with several
gaping wounds n his neck and chest, and the same dead eyes Rhett had seen in
other victims.
"Are you...okay?"
Rhett asked, not sure if he should respect a reaction. None of the other people
responded in any way besides murder, but Rhett felt that maybe a familiar face
could connect to someone. The bartender opened his mouth and moaned as he
reached over the bar to grab Rhett.
"Please," Rhett said
as he meekly held his gun out and aimed "Don't make me." The
bartender ignored him as he dragged himself along the bar and found a way free
so he could get to his next meal. "Just stay back!" Rhett screamed to
the deaf ears. He waited as long as he dared before firing a warning shot high.
The bartender didn't flinch as he continued his approach.
"Your funeral," he
said as he pulled the trigger and fired a shot into the bartenders stomach. He
stumbled, but did not relent. Rhett fired into his chest to similarly fruitless
results. Rhett retreated towards the wall, trying to create space, almost
tripping over one of the dead bodies. "Fuck," he yelled as he
steadied himself on his feet, glancing down at the body with a gunshot between
the eyes.
As soon as his back hit the
wall, Rhett raised the gun and aimed. The bartender stumbled forward to make
his move and Rhett pulled the trigger, blowing the top portion of the
bartender's head off and dropping him immediately. Rhett let out a deep breath
as he slid down the wall and sat on the ground. "Easy," he said as he
tried to catch his breath.
Some noise in the back room
caught Rhett's ear and he immediately scrambled to get up and ready his gun.
"Hello?" someone called out as they opened an employees only door and
stuck their head out. Rhett aimed his weapon and said nothing as the man looked
about and stopped at the sight of the gun.
"Whoa, whoa!" he
cried "Don't shoot, I'm a human!" Rhett lowered the gun and shook his
head. "You're the first person to actually say something to me since last
night," Rhett said as he walked towards the man. The man hobbled out and
stopped with Rhett at one of the only tables not overturned. "How long were
you back there?" Rhett asked.
"A while," the man
said "Names Chris."
"Rhett."
"Man, am I glad you're
here," Chris said with a smile as he offered his hand to shake. He was
middle aged and wearing dark pants and a dress shirt with rolled up sleeves and
an unraveled tie draped around his shoulders. He had disheveled blond hair that
stuck to his forehead from sweat and a beard that looked like it badly needed a
trim. "You have a phone or something?" Chris asked "The line
here's dead."
Rhett shook hands and said
"Sorry, left it at home." Chris shrugged "Ah well. I left mine
in my car, which I'm sad to say isn't exactly around the block."
"That sucks," Rhett
said before asking "What the hell happened here, Chris?"
"I wish I knew,"
Chris said as he placed his hands on his hips and forced a smile. " I
leave my night shift and it's the end of the God damn world. Driving home, I
see some guy wandering in the middle of the road, all bloody and stuff. I dial
9-1-1 but I can't get through. So I get out and ask the guy if he's alright,
and he grabs me and tries to bite my face off. I struggle him off of me when I
notice two more guys, all bloody too, and making their way for me.
"I immediately go for my
car. I figure that W-F disease is making
people crazy like the stories I heard about Mexico or somewhere. I never
thought they were real until there it was trying to bite me in the nose. I try
to drive away, but the problem is my window. See, my AC is busted and I roll my
windows down when I drive, so before I could drive, I got these arms reaching
in at me, faster than the window can roll up. I hit the gas, an arm grabs my
ear and jerks me to the side, it all happened so fast, and I end up going right
off the side of the road and into a ditch."
"Bust up your car?"
Rhett asked.
"It's stuck in there is
all," Chris said "Won't take much to get it out but I don't think AAA
is answering calls today. So anyway, I haul ass out of there and come across
this bar. I pound on the door and call for help, all while the three guys are
moaning and crawling after me, and now there's a fourth joining in. Luckily the
guy working here gets over in time to let me in, but not before the four
crazies shove their way in too.
"They literally bum rush
to door, knocking the two of us down. Next thing I know the guy working here is
pulling me up and shoving me towards the back room. He grabs a gun from behind
the bar and yells for me to hide in the office and not to come out. He looked
pretty bad, one of those things must have bit into his neck."
Rhett looked down towards the
bartender's body and saw the bite marks on the side of his neck. "I came
out with a knife I found in back," Chris continued "I thought I could
help after the shooting stopped. One of those things were still alive, though
tangled in a bunch of chairs after being tossed onto a table. The guy screamed
for me to get back where I was. He was in a bad way, looked like he was
bleeding out from more bites. Too bad he died before he could kill that last
crazy."
"What?" Rhett asked
as he turned to face Chris.
"The guy was bleeding
out," Chris said "Definitely a goner. I was afraid to come back out.
I figured if the guy was still alive, he'd come get me, but he didn't. Few
hours pass and I hear you shooting and here we are. thanks for killing that
last asshole, by the way."
"Which asshole?"
Rhett asked. Chris arched an eyebrow as he glanced for a moment at the corpse
Rhett had almost tripped over before. "He was dead when I got here,"
Rhett said. "Then who...?" Christ asked "Who were you shooting at?"
Rhett motioned to the body of the bartender. "Why would you-" Chris
began before Rhett cut him off "He was one of them."
"No he wasn't,"
Chris said a look of exacerbation washing over him "He was...he...he was
infected too?"
"He wasn't sick,"
Rhett said, a knot forming in his stomach.
"How do you know?"
"I was here last night. He's
the bartender. He was fine."
"Maybe he had the early
stages of the disease."
"Then why would it turn
his like this so fast?" Rhett asked as he looked back to the bites on the
bartender.
"But he died," Chris
said "How can he turn crazy if he's dead?"
Rhett walked to the body and
looked at where he shot him. The stomach and chest shots were clean hits, fatal
in most situations, but merely shrugged off here. He pondered all the injuries
he observed to this point. "He was already dead," he said as he
turned to Chris "They're all dead."
"Bullshit," Chris
said as he made a face.
"Look at these
injuries," Rhett said as he walked to each body in the bar, all of them
with some fatal injury to the neck and face that a gun did not cause.
"These people went crazy
from the infection," Chris said "They didn't die and just get back
up."
"It's the
infection," Rhett said "I think it does something to you."
"And if your bartender guy
here wasn't sick, then how did he get the infection and rise from the
dead?"
"...The bites,"
Rhett said after a pause "The bites transferred the infection."
"No," Chris yelled
as he began to pace "Gotta be another reason."
"Well what other reason
is there?"
"Just..." Chris
began but fell silent. He stopped pacing and sat down in a chair. "I was
so careful," he said "I wasn't getting sick. I gave up things I loved
and avoided certain friends I was afraid had the infection..." he trailed
off as he looked up to Rhett. "I just wanted to help that guy in the
street. I didn't know."
"Were you bit?"
Rhett asked as Chris pulled his pant leg up to reveal a bite mark on his calf,
a small amount of blood oozing down into his sock. "When they rushed the
door and knocked us down," Chris said, letting go and allowing the bite to
be covered "One of them grabbed my leg and got me before the bar guy
pulled me up."
Rhett sighed as he walked over
towards the bar. "I'm gonna die, aren't I?" Chris asked, his voice
taking on a stressed tone. "Probably," Rhett said as he eyed the area
behind the bar where the bartender originated, blood was pooled in the corner,
suggesting where the tender had bled out and died. Nearby was a double barreled
shotgun. Rhett grabbed a nearby rag and used it to pick the gun up with, taking
care not to touch any of the blood on it. He opened it to reveal it still had
one shell loaded.
"He had to have some ammo
somewhere," Rhett said to himself. "What do you mean
"probably"?" Chris yelled.
"How many people did you
know survive this?"
"Oh God..." Chris
buried his head in his hands. Rhett ignored him and continued his search. He
placed the shotgun on the bar and began digging through a cabinet. Chris
eventually regained his composure and made for the bar, Rhett tossing things
out from the cabinet at random in his search for ammo.
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