Read Among the Living Online

Authors: Timothy Long

Tags: #Fiction, #Horror, #Zombies, #Occult & Supernatural, #Action & Adventure, #End of the World, #living dead, #walking dead, #apocalypse, #brian keene, #night of the living dead, #the walking dead, #seattle, #apocalyptic fiction, #tim long, #world war z, #max brooks, #apocalyptic book

Among the Living (7 page)

BOOK: Among the Living
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Her thoughts drift until a line of green cuts across the road on the opposite side of the highway. Cruising along the right-hand lane is a steady stream of camouflaged vehicles. They stretch a mile into the distance and look very, well, shocking against the normally peaceful city.

“What the fuck?” she mutters for the second time in ten minutes.

The driver actually slows down as the green snake makes its way along the other side of the highway. He stares at it and then speeds up and is revving down the highway once again.

“Hey, I changed my mind. Can you take the next exit and drop me along Airport Way? I’ll show you the spot.”

“Fine,” he says in slightly accented English and shoots her a dirty look. She can understand; it means he will need to return after a short fare with no one in the car. She’ll just tip him well to make up for it.

 

* * *

 

After a long bus ride from the SoDo district back to Queen Anne, she walks into her apartment complex as herself. Long black hair dangles free, but she is still dressed in ‘work clothes,’ having changed her plans. Normally she goes to the airport and changes in a bathroom, dumps the luggage and catches a bus back in her normal clothes. Just like at the hotel, she is being ultra-paranoid, entering as one person, leaving as another.

The reason for the long, slow bus trip was the congestion caused by the Army trucks moving up and down the streets. She saw men getting out and standing at attention, other trucks stopping, taking up entire lanes while they waited for something. Was it a terrorist threat? Surely a little gas leak wouldn’t necessitate this many troops on the streets.

She takes the stairs, since there is no telling how long the old elevator will take if it is on the top floor. Besides, it’s only a few flights, and every little bit does her legs good. She thinks they’re a bit chunky, not that the men she killed ever complained when she stood or knelt naked for them. They are thick, sure, but that came with her training.

She leaves the stairwell and makes her way to her apartment. Passes the place belonging to the widow Mildred Jones, who is much younger than her name lets on. Her husband had died in the late eighties while working on the docks. A large settlement meant she didn’t have to work, so she stays cooped up. Contrary to every stereotype of a widowed woman with too many cats, she is actually fun to hang out with and always had a bag of weed on hand.

She slides her key into her apartment door, number 203, and it pops open. Bob Brason opens his door, and for a second she thinks of Rick Moranis in Ghostbusters, constantly waiting for Sigourney Weaver to come home so he can pop his head out and hit on her in his pathetic way. She tosses her bag into her apartment, quickly, hoping he doesn’t comment on it. “Gee Kate, why the laptop bag? Been on a business trip? That’s kinda weird. I mean, don’t you work at a bookstore?” She wants to pound on the voice that mocks her, the voice in her head that sometimes says the damnedest things.

Unlike Moranis, Bob is actually a cool guy who has the worst job Kate has ever heard of. Even her mindless existence at the bookstore downtown is better than what he does, although he does get to work from home.

Bob is in a bathrobe, as usual, and he sports at least two days’ worth of beard. He has his glasses on, and he must have been looking outside, because the transition lenses are dark. The thin wire frames disappear into the bushy growth of black hair that hangs down to obscure his ears and neck.

“Hey, kitty cat, you have a rough night?”

“Don’t call me that.”

“Sorry, kitty cat.”

“Yeah and your mom says hi,” she teases. Bob likes her, she knows this. Bob knows this. She likes Bob, but she doesn’t ever let on. In fact, she has made it clear that she is into women, even though she just fantasizes about that aspect of her sexuality. She can’t ever let on to Bob that she likes him; it would be far too dangerous for both of them. Sometimes she senses there is a mutual attraction, but she always puts him off by talking about some hot chick she is seeing.

“Harsh! Did she say what she wanted for Christmas? I want to get my shopping done early this year.”

“A new dishwasher. She’s tired of doing everything by hand.”

“That used to be my job. So she wants a seventeen-year-old kid who talks back a lot, got it.”

Kate smiles and then giggles at the joke.

“You in the hallway in your bathrobe for any other reason than to see my pretty face?” she inquires. “Don’t you have some pervs to call?”

Bob is a collection agent for a company that sells live porn feeds on the Internet. When the customers don’t pay up or their credit cards end up getting declined after they have rung up a large bill, they send Bob in. His favorite collection method is to leave messages that can be overheard by their spouses. Sometimes Kate wishes she could see the faces of the women who hear: “Hello, Mrs. Smith, your husband owes the she-male fuck city club six hundred dollars in charges. Will that be direct withdrawal from your bank account?”

“Nah, I was staring out the little hole in the door when you came down the stairs. There is some weird stuff going on out there, and the news stations are being way too cool about it. They say the military is just doing practice drills, but did you see those assholes on every corner?”

“I know, right?” Kate exclaims.

“It’s the gas leak, has to be. Half the damn city closed down, and they moved people out of the affected neighborhood. But why is everyone acting so weird? If it’s just a gas leak, do we really need the fucking Army to get involved?”

“You are kidding, I hope.” Kate sets her night bag down and leans against her door, kicks one leg back, foot arched against it so her knee sticks out. Bob leans against his doorframe and lowers his voice.

“Nope. But when you do searches, sometimes stuff disappears even as you look it up. I’ve been on the net for a long time, and I’ve never seen anything like it. Even cached pages are all fucked up. Like if I search for a page and it doesn’t come up, Google usually has a stored version of it available. That isn’t bringing stuff up anymore.”

“Maybe Google is just having issues,” she thinks out loud and wishes she still smoked so she could add a cig to this bullshit session. She really wants to go inside and go to bed, but Bob is one of her few friends, and she likes to listen to him. Sometimes he reminds her of what a college professor should be. Well, if a college professor collected for the porn industry.

“Maybe, and maybe the Army is just doing a practice drill that means they have to mobilize a few thousand troops and put them on the streets of Seattle. Come on, this is the most laid-back city in the world. You were on the street. Was that normal?”

That gives her pause as she thinks about the guys jumping out of truck beds, checking weapons, looking confused, waiting for orders. It didn’t look normal at all. In fact, it looked downright screwed up.

“You go do some searches and then tell me what you think.”

“I’m gonna get some rest first. I’m beat,” she says, the irony of the statement not lost on her or the other. Kate spins around, knowing his eyes are on her legs but not caring. She glances over her shoulder and blows him a kiss.

“Who’s the lucky girl?” he inquires as she opens the door.

“Just someone I met online. I don’t think we’re going to see each other again.” Then she slips inside and closes the door. Home at last, and boy is she glad for the comfort. She can’t help but feel dirty from the night before, dirty and used. Her back, thighs, and ass are a constant wave of pain as she moves. Pain that makes her focus her thoughts. Pain that makes her hot when she thinks of the night before, not the killing but the way the bastard made her sit in the chair and took the flogger to her with a passion. She wonders what it would be like to have Bob do the same to her and feels a warm rush between her legs.

Maybe she will go to bed and think about it a bit more while satisfying herself. Then she sees the image of the guy she butchered, and she is no longer horny. She just wants to curl up and die.

 

 

Mike
 

 

“Turkey bacon avocado!” she calls out in accented English. She is the only one working at the deli, so it takes a couple extra minutes. It’s quieter than usual; the other customers have long since departed. I go to pay and grab a bag of spicy chips on the way. When she zips my credit card, I notice that she looks haggard, keeps glancing at the clock, which hangs next to a full wall map of South Korea. There are pictures of military transports on the wall as well; the owner used to fly for the Air Force.

“Where’s Lou?”

“He not feeling well.” She clenches her face, which tells me he is probably sitting at home on the crapper. I feel sorry for him, but it’s not like we are best friends. I only shoot the breeze with him while I wait for food.

The walk back is warmer. It seems like the sun is making a comeback over the morning clouds, so I take my time. There are others on the street, but I’m used to seeing more people. I walk toward Puget Sound. The mountains cut a beautiful sight against the backdrop of hazy sky. Boats flit here and there on the dark water, making bright white wakes. A ferry is powering toward the islands across the water.

When I get back to my desk, my cell buzzes again. Rita. I snap open the phone.

“You doing okay?”

“Yeah. There is so much yelling, though. There are police everywhere.” I hear the clink of ice in a glass as she tosses something back.

“What’s going on?”

“I don’t know. There was fighting a few doors down, and then it stopped. I heard banging and lots of loud steps.” She pauses to take a breath and then slurs into the phone, “Then all these cops were here with guns drawn. I think someone may be hurt or there was a fight.”

The glass clinks again.

Rita lives in a small apartment on Capitol Hill. We used to have a house out in Auburn, but we ended up moving into different places during the divorce. After the settlement, I didn’t have to worry about money to take care of Rita and the house, so in an unusual moment of clarity, I paid down our loan and refinanced the remainder at a honey of a rate. Now I have a mortgage that is less than most people’s car payments, and she can afford a nice apartment near the city.

It’s really pathetic that a woman who used to be an architect lives alone and is content to sit around her tiny apartment with her computer and a TV for company. Not to mention the ever-present plastic jug of vodka.

“Can you see anything?”

I hear her slide the curtains back. I can see the scene in my head, the circular parking lot full of cars. The road that leads out encompassed by trees. It may be an inexpensive place to live, but it is very well kept.

“There are some people moving around. I think the cops are trying to arrest someone. Um ...”

“What do you see?”

“He ... he’s a big guy, and he’s covered in blood.”

This gives me pause. Should I leave work and rush over there? If I call a cab, it can probably get me there in fifteen or twenty minutes. The police probably have the situation in hand, and it will just depress me to see my ex-wife drunk in the middle of the day. I wonder if she would be seeing what she is describing without an alcohol-fueled sense of reality.

“He’s, wait … he’s fighting. There are three cops trying to snap cuffs on him. He … oh my God! He broke free and hit one of the officers. The guy fell down. I think he got hit hard. The other cops are trying to tackle him but … oh what the ... the guy is biting one of them. Oh my God!”

“Rita, why don’t you go sit down and see if there is anything on TV?” The words are stupid. I know she won’t be able to look away. I wouldn’t. Did she say biting?

“No. He is getting to his feet. The cops have their guns drawn. They’re shouting. The other cop is lying on his back … he’s bleeding a lot. Okay, the first cop is trying to get to the biter.”

There is a bang and then another; they resonate in the tiny speaker.

“Rita! Get down!” I yell into the phone, and for the first time I notice the entire office is staring at me. Erin’s face is painted with concern, she half stands up, but I shoot her a small shake of my head, so she sits back down.

“It’s okay. The guy is down, and the cops are taking care of the bleeding partner. More police are arriving and a couple of ambulances. It looks like they put a few bullets into the attacker … wait, he’s moving again.”

“Where did they shoot him?”

“Chest, I think. He must be on something. He’s on his feet and … oh my God, he’s attacking another cop. He’s on top of him, biting him like the first one. The cop is trying to hit the guy but it … Jesus, what is he on?”

“Rita, do you want me to come get you?” Her phone starts to fuzz and turn to static.

“I think it’s okay now. The other cops are getting out of their cars, and they have more guns.”

There is a series of loud pops that get lost in more static. I yank the phone off my ear like it is red hot and stare at the display. I have a row of full bars, so it isn’t me. More bursts when I put the phone to my ear.

“Rita!”

“They got him, but I think they hit some of the other cops too. I need to rest now. Oh my God.” Then the line dissolves into static and clicks off.

BOOK: Among the Living
2.66Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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