Dark Recollections (12 page)

Phil moved to the end of the counter near the door and put his hand on the revolver he kept holstered on his hip. Bob and Mike were also behind the counter, but sped around it towards the door to get a better look at what was happening outside.

Phil could see clearly that sitting in the passenger side of the car there was a young kid, maybe 12 or 13 years old. He was absolutely mortified at what was happening. Phil knew it was the driver’s son immediately. McGreevy leveled his weapon at the chest of the driver and yelled for him to freeze again. The driver was sliding along the front fender of the car, leaning heavily, like he was drunk. He slid one hand along the hood absently as he moved, like his arm was dead weight. That was when Phil noticed the crimson stain spreading out from the man’s forearm. His bluish white shirt sleeve had a menacing red stain on it.

Phil couldn’t see well enough at his age to see if the man was frothing at the mouth, or if he was clearly out of control, but McGreevy could. The Officer’s service weapon barked angrily a few times, and the driver immediately went flat on his face like a sack of mail. Mike and Bob grabbed their guns and bolted out the door. Phil just stood there behind the counter. He’d seen this before, back in Vietnam, and had seen enough already. He didn’t need to see any more dead bodies.

A screeching of brakes down the street echoed shortly after the gunshot. Another car, this one a grey import sedan sped in reverse, returning to the Moore’s parking lot. Phil could see through the window enough that he made out that it was Adrian, the man who just left. Apparently he was returning to see what had happened. The muffled screams of the adolescent boy in the car were starting to get louder when Mike and Bob started hooting and hollering.

McGreevy took a few steps closer to the fallen body of the out of state driver, and put one more round into the back of his head. Phil could see Adrian and the Officer exchanged glances before he drove off. That was the last time he saw the Adrian guy.

McGreevy called in the ambulance immediately, and notified the Chief. The rest of the Moore’s staff helped McGreevy with the kid. He was hysterical, and they got him as far away from the scene as they could, which turned out to be Mr. Moore’s office. Luckily, Mr. Moore had a talent for dealing with kids, and especially the hysterical ones. It didn’t hurt that he had another Danish in his desk either. Just minutes later the ambulance pulled into the parking lot with the Chief’s cruiser in tow.

It took almost an hour to get everything figured out. It took another five minutes for everything to go to hell after that. The young boy, whose name turned out to be David, had just arrived in town from out of state, where he and his family lived. As he told it, in slight hysterics, his 8 year old younger brother had gotten rushed to the hospital in his hometown during lunch at school. Apparently he had been choking on something, and they were unable to clear his airway in time. He suffered some form of brain damage, and as David put it, “he had become a veggie burger.”

David’s mother and father made the decision just hours ago to pull the plug on their son and donate his organs to other needy, sick children. So with doctor supervision, they removed David’s little brother from life support, and shortly thereafter, his little heart stopped beating.

David said he wasn’t sure what exactly happened then, but his mother and father were crying a lot, and were holding his little brother when something bad happened. His mother was hurt, bitten badly by his little brother in the neck. McGreevy, the Chief, and the paramedics surmised that it was an arterial spray, probably caused by a bite to the neck. She bled out all over the hospital room, and died within seconds. While trying to save his wife, David’s father was bitten in the arm by his dead son too.

David said that his father backhanded the little boy as hard as he could, and the two of them left the room, slamming the door behind them. Phil cringed as the details were spilled out by the young boy. He was far too young to have witnessed such horror.

David described through tears that the hospital had become a nightmare. Staff was leaving because it was too dangerous, some patients were dying from whatever conditions that brought them there, and more and more ambulances kept showing up with hurt and dying people from all over. The little boy said that within minutes of his brother dying, there were dozens of the sick, attacking more and more of the living.
 

He said his grandparents lived here in town, and his father got them out of the hospital, fighting off more than ten of the rampaging monsters that seemed to multiple faster than possible. The father and son got to their car and escaped north on side roads to here. David said about 30 minutes into the drive his father started to not feel well. His bite wouldn’t stop bleeding no matter how much pressure David put on it in the car. He also said his father started to get sleepy, and was sweating like he was running a marathon. They stopped here so they could get a gun and a first aid kit. His father was scared of the hospitals now.

Everyone in the office was floored by the story the child shared. The silence was awkward, and palpable. No one knew what to say to each other, let alone to the child. David yawned though, and took off the baseball jacket he was wearing, and a paramedic broke the silence.

“David what’s that blood on your shoulder?” The young female paramedic asked as she pointed to the kid’s collar. He had a small dark brown stain right in the middle of the shoulder and the neck.

“Oh it’s nothing, when we were escaping I got bit by one of the nurses that got sick, I’m fine though.”
 
David yawned again and wiped his brow, which was now covered in a thin film of sweat. Everyone else in the room shifted back, away from the kid. The Chief moved his body slightly, putting it between the kid and the entrance to the hall.

“Wha…” David tried to ask what was wrong, but the word half fell out of his mouth, and he collapsed face first out of the chair, straight to the floor. The two paramedics yelled for space, and the Moore’s employees quickly exited the room as they got to work. The two police officers stayed inside, gathering equipment and handing it off to the paramedics. All of the other men gathered in the hall just outside the room, trying to watch what was happening.

The two paramedics worked feverishly to figure out what was happening to little boy. They checked his vitals and tore his shirt off to get a better look at the bite on his shoulder. Once the wound was exposed everyone gasped. The bite mark was very deep, and was surrounded by an angry red halo of infection. The flesh was swollen and was turning a slight shade of grayish blue right at the edge of the teeth marks. A very unhealthy wound indeed.

Within a minute the two emergency technicians were performing CPR on the limp boy. They pumped his chest vigorously while squeezing an air bulb connected to a plastic mask on his face, trying to get life back into his tortured little body. The boy’s arms and legs jumped with every powerful chest compression. They struggled for nearly ten minutes before they slumped to the floor next to his dead body, defeated. The male paramedic’s eyes welled with tears, and soon after, everyone was rubbing their eyes, and all were in shock from what had just happened. The Chief excused himself out of the room, unable to contain his emotions. Not 20 minutes ago this young boy was talking, had emotions, and was alive and well. Now he was on the floor dead, his life gone.

The whole group of people assembled was in shock. No one spoke at all, at least not until David started to twitch. Both paramedics jumped into action and wiped their eyes clear of tears. Phil’s heart leapt out of his mouth as he felt a sudden burst of hope. All he could think of was his two grandkids out there somewhere, and about how he hoped nothing like this would ever happen to them.

The two paramedics started to take David’s vitals and get an oxygen feed on his nose. His little frame went from twitching to still again in seconds. The two paramedics hovered over his chest, confused. Then his eyes snapped open, and all hell broke loose. David’s dead eyes focused on the woman EMT right above his head, and he snapped up at her, biting the underside of her arm viciously. A gout of blood sprayed all over David and the floor of the office as she leapt away, clutching her arm. As soon as that happened the other paramedic grabbed David by the shoulder and pinned him to the floor, but his wrist was too close to the kid’s face, and David turned his head and chomped down on him.

His little teeth dug into the wrist until blood flowed freely, and the medic had to yank away. This turned out to be a terrible mistake though, as when he yanked away David’s teeth stayed firm, and a giant chunk of the wrist came free from his arm, severing tendons and veins. He fell onto his back holding his bleeding arm, blood vessels exposed, screaming, and started to go into shock.

The Moore’s employees were flat out dumbfounded. Their entire world had been turned on its head in mere minutes. As they stood slack-jawed the little teenager sat himself up and crawled across the office floor to the frozen medic with the bleeding wrist. With no compassion, no malice, and no emotion whatsoever, he bit the arm again, ripping another chunk out. It was as if he were a machine, slowly, silently consuming the meat in front of him. The paramedic tipped over, slipping even further into shock as he was eaten alive one child sized bite at a time.

The lady bitten in the arm who had tried to resuscitate David shoved her way past the Moore’s men, screaming for them to get out of her way. She took off at full speed down the hall and out into the store. They could vaguely hear the bells ringing on the door as she left. Eventually, the shock of what was happening was shattered when a gun went off.

Phil had quietly drawn his revolver and shot David in the side. His little frame was tossed violently against the corner of Mr. Moore’s desk from the impact of the heavy slug. His back snapped in two as he was bent around the edge of the desk. He crumpled in a heap on the floor.

“Jesus Phil it was a fucking kid!” Mike screamed.

Mr. Moore yelled back in Phil’s defense, “Shut the fuck up Mike. That kid was sick, and he woulda eaten you just as soon as he got done with the guy in there.” Mike shook his head in disbelief.

“Sir, you know I love you, but I am the fuck out of here. I gotta get my parents and my girlfriend, and my dog, and head up to our hunting cabin, this shit ain’t funny anymore.” Bobby said, looking desperate. Mr. Moore nodded, and Bobby was gone out the front immediately. He passed the Chief who had run back inside, gun drawn.

Mr. Moore walked slowly into his office, and knelt over the prone form of the paramedic. He checked his neck for a pulse, but shook his head. There was no pulse to be found, and now they had a dead paramedic to add to their growing list of casualties.

Mr. Moore looked up to his son the Chief and shook his head in total disbelief. You could read the expression as plain as day.
 

“This can’t be happening.”

Suddenly Mr. Moore’s face twisted in pain, and he let out a yelp and grabbed at his ankle. From behind him, the corpse of little David had taken a bite out of his Achilles tendon. Mr. Moore tilted forward and fell on his side, scrambling as best as he could to get away from the wrecked body of the boy. The Chef stepped into the room, and he and McGreevy began firing at the child. The racket was deafening in the hall. Officer and Chief emptied their weapons into the little boy, sending his body flipping back and forth all the way into the corner of the office until it came to rest propped up at an odd angle against a file cabinet.

Phil’s ears were ringing loudly as the two men ended their barrage on the boy. Mike started to mumble quietly, shaking his head. All he could manage, over and over, was, “no.. no.. no..” Eventually he turned, and walked out of the store. Ben looked around the room, and without waiting for any acknowledgment, walked out following Mike.

Mr. Moore in the meantime had started to let slip a string of profanities that would make a drunken sailor blush. The Chief and Officer McGreevy went to his aid as Phil just tried to regain his hearing. He holstered his revolver and rubbed his temples in a vain attempt to repair his beaten eardrums.

“Dad are you okay?” Chief Moore knelt beside his elderly father, checking his leg. McGreevy thumbed his walkie again and started to send out the call for additional medical personnel. No one was answering.

“What the hell is happening?” Mr. Moore said through clenched teeth. He exhaled powerfully, frustrated and in pain.

“I don’t know Dad, but we’re having more ambulances come, and they’ll take you to the hospital, we’ll get this sorted out.” The Chief was starting to panic, his voice was cracking.

“Nope. Doesn’t work that does it son?” Mr. Moore shook his head, wincing in pain. “Those bites are all it takes. Look at what happened here, right here, right now. That boy was bitten and he now he’s bitten me and that that man there.” He poked a finger over at the slumped form of the dead paramedic. “He’ll be trying to eat you before we know it, and then I will too.”

The Chief’s eyes were spilling tears down his cheeks, “That’s bullshit Dad, nonsense, help is coming.” He shook his head defiantly against his Dad.

“Only help I’m getting now is a bullet to my temple. Who’s doing it for me?” Mr. Moore winced again in pain and made a conscious effort to make eye contact with the three other men remaining in the room. McGreevy shook his head in a clear no, stood up, and walked out of the room. He wanted no part of this.

The Chief was sobbing now. He buried his face in his father’s chest and hugged him awkwardly. Looking over his son’s shoulder he locked gazes with Phil. Phil knew what had to happen. Mr. Moore nodded ever so slightly, and hugged his son back for the last time.

After a moment or two, Mr. Moore said, “Alright, tell your Mother I love her, and you take care of her now. You get your ass home and take care of Stacey and your boy. To hell with the town now, you take care of them.” Mr. Moore’s voice cracked at the end. He saw the writing on the wall, felt his clock ticking down.