Ground Zero: A Zombie Apocalypse (8 page)

Behind him, Cutter heard one of the wome
n gasp.

In another instant it was all over. The undead
rushed up and over the sides of the vehicle and clawed at the soldier behind the machine gun. He flailed out with his fists, and then fell into the surging crowd, screaming in terror. The camera jerked again, and then zoomed close. The image became grainy, but not so obscured that Cutter couldn’t see three of the undead hurl themselves down through the open hatch of the armored vehicle.

The camera cut away suddenly, and the image returned to the announcer in the studio. Th
e man’s face was ashen. He stared at the screen for long seconds of shocked, grieving silence, and when he finally spoke his voice was heavy. He looked down at a sheath of typed notes clutched in his hands.

“Repeating the news from
earlier…”
he said slowly.
“A state of Martial Law has been declared across the eastern seaboard of the United States. Speaking from a secured bunker earlier today, the President confirmed that the military has been issued executive orders to shoot to kill anyone on the streets. Citizens are advised to remain in doors and all air traffic across the country has been grounded indefinitely by the FAA.”
The man paused, then looked back to the screen.
“There is a total blockade on all civilian vehicular movement, and the military is drawing a defensive line from Chicago in the north through St Louis, to Memphis, to New Orleans in the south, called Line 55. Those west of the I-55 Interstate are urged to avoid all contact with anyone wounded or presenting symptoms of abnormal behavior, and to report any suspicious activity immediately to authorities. Those people still alive east of the Chicago-New Orleans infection line are urged to seek the safety of any nearby military installations that may be operational. You are warned not to attempt to reach the defensive line being set up by the military. Repeat: do not attempt to approach the defensive containment barrier. Anyone approaching the I-55 Containment line from the east will be shot and killed.”

Cutter turned s
lowly away from the television, while behind him, the screen filled with fresh images showing army helicopters airlifting huge iron pylons and concrete slabs.

“It’s the Berlin Wall all over again,” one of the older women in the group said softly. “They’re building a wall and abandoning us.”

Below the transport helicopters, long snaking lines of army trucks were winding their way across deserted roads, kicking up clouds of dust across the horizon, while sleek helicopter gunships swarmed through the sky. Tanks took up positions blocking arterial freeways, hull-down behind concrete barriers.

Cutter went to the tiny sink and drank a glass of water. All the coffee was gone. When he turned back, Ho
s was changing channels on the television, scrolling through hissing static until he found another station that was still broadcasting.  Two women reporters were sitting stiffly at a news presenter’s desk and behind them was a graphic showing three army tanks and the legend ‘Line 55’ in large red lettering.

One of the women was reading from a tel
eprompter, while the other stared numbly at the camera.

The graphic behind the presenters changed suddenly to an all-yellow screen with several lines of bold black type.

“Here’s what we now know,”
the announcer began expanding on each of the points that were showing on the screen.
“The infection is a virus, and at this stage there is no known antidote. The virus is one hundred percent fatal. The virus is spread through bites and exposure to infected saliva or blood. Once infected, the dead re-animate – yes reanimate – within three to eight minutes.”
There was a long pause, before the woman continued to the second point.
“It has been confirmed that the infected become faster once the virus has fully taken over their body. Initial reports of the undead moving slowly have now been refuted by several incidents in Virginia, Pennsylvania and New York over the past few hours. Those still living east of Line 55 are urged to take extreme caution and should avoid areas of dense population wherever possible.”

The woman went through the rest of the list but Cutter was
barely listening. He heard the woman mention that the undead seemed to be aroused and enraged by noise, but little else until she came to the final point.

“President Sharpe has promised full and violent retribution should the spread of the virus be proven to be a terrorist attack on America,”
she said.
“At this stage the government has not ruled out the possibility but remains guarded and cautious. So far eighteen terrorist organizations have claimed responsibility for the plague. Government investigations are said to be continuing, alongside the largest peace-time mobilization of military and civilian forces in the nation’s history.”

The screen cut to a grab of the President, standing
at a lectern. There was a blue curtain behind him. At the President’s shoulder stood several grim-faced men in uniforms. Cutter stopped listening. Presidential messages of hope and promise weren’t going to change the situation or alter the reality.

They
had been left to die.

* * *

Cutter lost all sense of time. Under the artificial light, every moment was the same, so he was surprised when the blonde woman he had first seen behind the steel door drifted out from the kitchen area carrying two glasses of water.

“It’s eight o’clock,” she said. “I thought you might like a drink.”

Cutter nodded. The woman sat down on the hard concrete floor beside him and leaned her back against the brick wall. She watched Cutter sip at the water and smiled wanly.

Cutter studied the woman over the rim of his glass as he d
rank. She had fixed her hair, and washed her face. Her eyes were still red and puffy, but she had touched at her features with makeup in some small gesture of vanity.

She was pretty, Cutter realized.
He guessed that she was in her late twenties. She had long blonde hair that spilled over her shoulders in a cascade of curls, and enormous green eyes. Her features were petite, her mouth wide, her body slim and with a lithe athleticism that suggested long hours in a gym.

Cutter smiled
back at the woman, and set the glass down.

He was hunched against the wall, using his
pocket-knife to whittle the length of a broom handle down to a point. He had two other makeshift spears already completed. He stretched the cramped muscles across his back and shoulders.

The woman held out her hand.
“Glenda,” she said softly.

“Cutter. Jack Cutter.”

The woman’s hand was small and delicate. She had long sculptured fingers and nails that were painted pink. Her skin was smooth and soft, but her grip was surprisingly firm.

The others in the group had drifted to all parts of the warehouse. Several women remained in the lunchroom, seated around the table. The television had been turned off, but the women sat chatting in a desultory hush, perhaps drawn by the comfort of the bright overhead lights. Others had taken books from the shelves and sat in quiet corners reading. John Grainger was pacing the room, walking between the rows of high dusty
bookcases, measuring each step as though the monotony of walking was a hedge against his panic, while by the boarded-up shipping door at the rear of the building, Jimmy was preparing more weapons. Apart from the hammers, he had found a fire-axe and a short lump of lead pipe that he hefted like a club.

Cutter watched them with a kind of detached fascination. Every person was handling the crisis in their own way, internalizing their fears and panic – blocking out the nightmare images – and trying to ward off the crushing despair of hopelessness that seemed to fill the very air.

Only Hos seemed to be driven by a purpose.

The big man was sitting at
the foot of the stairs that led up to the steel door. He had the black bag at his feet, quietly going through the contents, checking and re-checking equipment. In the gloomy lighting he was just a vague shape, but every once in a while Cutter sensed the survivalist’s eyes upon him – watching him in stealthy, brooding silence from the darkness.

Cutter tur
ned back to the woman. She was sitting close beside him – so close that he could sense the warmth of her body and smell the faint lingering muskiness of her perfume. She had her head tilted back against the wall, her eyes closed in an attitude of weary fatigue, exposing the long soft lines of her throat. She had unfastened the top button of her blouse, and as Cutter followed the line of her neck, he could see a glimpse of pale cleavage. He looked away and stared fixedly off into space, then sighed.

“I never dreamed this day would come,” he said softly. “I just never thought it could ever happen.”

He sensed the woman’s eyes opening and her face turning to him. “None of us did,” she said softly. “There have been so many predictions about the end of the world. Who would ever have thought it would come unannounced, and without any time to prepare?”

Cutter grinned wryly. “Hos,” he said. “He’s a survivalist. The bastard has been waiting for this
day to come. It’s the moment he has spent his life preparing for.”

Glenda nodded slowly. “When he first started work here at the bookstore, he used to creep me out,” she confessed in a whisper. “Just the way he acted and the things he said. All he ever talked about was guns, you know,” she shrugged. “I thought he was going to end up on the news – one of those crazy guys holed up in a house somewhere surrounded by police cars.” The thought made
her giggle, and the sound was such a shock that Cutter turned to her so their faces were just inches apart.

“Well he’s the one who is laughing now,” Cutter whispered. “He’s the one guy we need to have any chance of surviving Armageddon – and he’s the only one who doesn’t need any of us to help him.”

Cutter’s thoughts drifted back to the horror of the day and he felt a cold sense of clammy despair clutch at his heart. Was their really any point in trying to survive? Why couldn’t he just lie down and die – maybe end it all right now by chewing on a bullet?

He closed his eyes and asked softly, “Did you have family?”

“No,” Glenda said sadly. “Not really. I was an orphan. I lived with a foster family in Omaha until I was seventeen. Then I moved here to find work…” her voice drifted to silence for a wistful moment. “There were a couple of guys… but nothing serious.” She shifted her weight subtly, until her shoulder was brushing against his. Cutter didn’t move, but he felt a sudden sense of intimacy.

“
How about you? Did you lose anyone?” Glenda asked him softly. “Do you have family nearby?”

Cutter thought about how to answer. It was a simple question, but for Jack Cutter, the answer was darkly complicated. He nodded slowly. “I lost my wife and my son,” he said. “But not to the virus. They were killed in a car crash last week.”

He heard Glenda gasp softly. “Oh, God. I’m so sorry,” she said, and Cutter believed her. “Was… was it an accident?”

Cutter nodded, and
felt the crushing despair and misery of his loss well up until it was like a knot in his chest. “Yes,” he said. “I was driving. It was late at night. A dog ran out on the road. I swerved…”

“But you survived.”

“Yes. Not a scratch on me, but my wife and son were so horribly crushed and disfigured I could barely recognize the bodies.”

They stared at each other in the gloom for long uncertain seconds
of silence and anguish, and then a sudden movement caught in the corner of Cutter’s eye made him turn away. One of the other women who worked in the bookstore was walking past them, her heels loud and echoing in the sullen silence. She was a tall woman, very young. She walked with her back straight, thrusting her breasts out firm against the fabric of her blouse. She had long red hair. She sensed Cutter watching her and she gave him a lingering glance as she passed. Cutter felt Glenda’s hand on his forearm.

“I’m not surprised,”
Glenda whispered, and there was a harsh sound of distain in her voice. “If anyone was going to try it, I knew it would be that little slut.”

Cutter frowned. “Try it?”

Glenda followed the younger woman with her eyes, tracking her as she sauntered towards where Hos sat on the steps. “She’s going to make a play for Hos in the hope he will take her with him when we break out of here.”

Cutter shook his head. “You’re fucking joking!”

Glenda sniffed. “It takes a woman to know a woman,” she said with a kind of abstractness that Cutter didn’t follow. “Jillian is just doing what a lot of the others have already considered.”

Glenda’s words hung in the air for a long moment. Cutter turned back to her slowly. “Including you…?”

Glenda didn’t answer. She glanced towards the stairs. Jillian was standing in front of Hos, leaning against the railing with her other hand resting on her narrow waist. Her hips were tilted at a sensual angle so that her skirt pulled tight across the shape of her thighs and bottom. As Glenda and Cutter watched, Hos muttered something and Jillian leaned closer to the man and then nodded her head willingly.