One Blink From Oblivion (8 page)

***

Max’s eyes have dilated enough for him to see a bit in the darkness and what they show him is a wild looking red-eyed Vinny, covered in blood and shuffling his way toward him. Max swallows hard and curses himself for sending Vinny in alone and unaware of the threat he was facing. Now, from the look of him, he is not only infected but has already found and fed on his first victim –most likely Lisa. He must have cornered her down here where she got off a few shots before he ripped her apart. Max hadn’t been fast enough to save either of them. Lisa had shared Onan’s fate and Vinny had shared Vanessa’s. If he is to break the chain, it has to be done here and now. No time for contemplation can be spared. It is time to flip that switch, embrace what he’d feared, and protect those that remain. At this distance, if he is discovered by Vinny there is no way he could make it out alive. He has to be proactive.

Max looks down the sights of the short-barreled riot shotgun and lines up Vinny for a headshot. He is reminded of words spoken long ago by his father, “Some think shootin’ a man is easy, like mailing a letter. You just pull the trigger, send it off and the rest is out of your hands until it reaches where it’s going. That’s bullshit boy. When you shoot a man, there’s nothing between you and him but the skin of your palm pressed against that handle and your fingertip on the trigger. The bullet is an extension of your will that you can’t take back once it’s flown from the barrel on its way to take his life. Ain’t nothing more up close and personal than that”. He struggles to hold back a sob that would give away his position. Max can’t believe that he once again faces a circumstance similar to the one that had left him scarred for life at such young age. But just like before, he knows what he must do.

Vinny has his head down and mercifully hasn’t noticed Max against the wall sheathed in darkness. Max begins to tighten his finger on the trigger. His eyes squint in preparation of the deafening blast that his shotgun is sure to produce. He watches as Vinny reaches for something at the base of the cell door and pulls it, causing the door to squeal in reply. Max tightens his finger a little more until only a millimeter remains between life and death. He silently says a final teary goodbye to not only his best friend, but also his only friend with knowledge of the truth about his past. He hears an unearthly growl rise and knows that the Vinny he knew is gone.

***

The pain in Vinny’s shoulder makes pulling the sheet from under the door an awkward affair and in his struggles to free it he takes no notice of the high-pitched squall it makes. Unfortunately, the sound reawakens a hungry fury from behind him. A throaty growl, quiet at first but building in intensity, rises from where he’d left -what he thought to be- Lisa’s lifeless body. He turns just in time to see a fully animated Lisa rising to her feet and advancing on him across the ransacked cell. He has already begun to reach for his weapon when he remembers –bitterly- that the revolvers cylinder is empty. He realizes in that moment that he will soon meet the same fate as Zack, ‘that poor bastard’. He is about to die alone in a cannibalistic rage. A gunshot rings out, piercing his right eardrum and smashing Lisa square in the chest.

‘CRACK, CRACK’
, the next two shots come in rapid succession knocking Lisa back but not down.

The thunderous roar reverberating through the small concrete cell coupled with the blinding pain from Vinny’s left shoulder make his ears ring and vision begin to blur, but not before he can make out the grotesque figure of Lisa regaining her footing and advancing on him once more.

***

A split second before Max could muster the courage to pull the trigger that last millimeter and take his friend’s life he saw a stirring in the cell behind him as a madwoman in a yellow and blood-soaked crimson windbreaker rose and flung herself at Vinny. Max pulled the trigger and let the buckshot fly, hitting the thing center mass. He slid back the cocking mechanism and plunged the next shell into the chamber. He cracked off the next two shots with growing aptitude. To Max’s dismay the mighty blasts only stumbled the monster briefly. It soon recovered and resumed its vector toward Vinny who was teetering, apparently on the verge of collapse.

***

Max has time to chamber one more shell and is desperate to make it count. He shoves the barrel between the bars of the cage and lets loose with an explosive shredder, zeroed in on the creature’s head. The effect is shattering as bits of gray matter and bone fragments paint the walls and bars in varying shades of death. The shredders were indeed true to their name.

With the most immediate threat extinguished, Max now turns his sights back to Vinny who has indeed collapsed. He has to be sure. He cautiously approaches Vinny’s flaccid body, fearing another Lisa-like revival. He kneels down next to him and gingerly rolls him over. He is relieved to see that Vinny has not been shot and though the available light leaves Max wanting, his friend appears to be free of bite marks. Though he is covered in blood, Max finds no wounds on Vinny and concludes that none of the blood is his. Vinny’s chest is rising indicating that he yet lives.

Vinny’s head had landed on a bed sheet that was bundled up on the floor behind the cell door. Max realizes that Vinny must have been reaching for this when he first saw him. Max props the shotgun against the bars, not bothering to reload it. He still has a couple of shredders left in the gun and after witnessing the effect they’d had on Lisa he was confident they would suffice should the need arise.

Max removes Vinny’s shirt to continue his inspection, “Damn!” he exclaims upon sight of Vinny’s left shoulder.

It is already crimson and blue and it looks misshapen under the skin. A large lump bulges where no lump has any business being, and a dugout now remains where the bulbous protrusion of bone once stood. The combination of searing pain and dehydration from last night’s alcohol binge must have caused him to pass out. Max considers this a good sign since it was unlikely a biter would succumb to, or even feel, pain.  

Max gets busy tearing the sheet and fashioning it into a sling. He is thankful that Vinny isn’t awake to feel what he is about to do. After pulling Vinny up and toward him, Max places a hand on Vinny’s shoulder and another around his back. He pulls Vinny closer with one hand while he presses against his shoulder with the other in a jerking movement that produces a loud bony ‘snap’. He then takes Vinny’s forearm and jerks it down and away from his body. Max is no doctor but for most collegiate-level football players the injury is familiar and doesn’t usually require surgery to fix. He figures if the shoulder is merely dislocated then better to attempt realignment now, than wait until Vinny comes to.

Once Max is satisfied that he’s done all he can with the shoulder, he places the sling around Vinny’s neck and inserts the injured arm. He sees a backpack lying nearby and pulls it to him. The pack is surprisingly heavy and /Max is delighted when he discovers its contents.

“That’s my boy,” he says quietly with a smile and stuffs what remains of the sheet into the backpack that is now full to bursting.

    Max slings the backpack over one shoulder and turns to Vinny. Since he is unconscious -and by no means, a small guy- Max knows he would never make it up the stairs with him in tow. He steps out of the cell and looks for an emergency exit sign. Max knows that even if the power is out on the detention level any exit signs should be running on a battery backup. They are in luck. Six cells back, there is a barely lit exit sign over a dark recess in the wall. Given the circumstances when he’d past it the first time, Max isn’t surprised that he hadn’t noticed it until now. It turns out that the sign is in fact the source he can thank for the miniscule amount of light in this lower level.

Max lifts Vinny up onto his knees, places his left shoulder against Vinny’s stomach and hoist him up and across his back in one jerky motion. He waivers slightly while his legs adjust to the increased load of not only Vinny, but also the fully stacked backpack. He reaches down and grabs hold of the warm barrel of the shotgun still propped against the bars.

Through this entire process, he keeps his eyes trained on the ground not desiring another look at the grizzly wallpaper he’d created just minutes ago. It wouldn’t do for him to loose his stomach contents now.

Max trudges his way to the emergency exit and finds it locked. He figures a locked exit door in such close proximity to holding cells was a necessary evil. No matter, he had the master key and didn’t mind using it. He steps back at an angle, and without dropping Vinny he raises the shotgun with a single powerful arm and booms one more shredder from the barrel, splintering the knob and lock into a thousand different pieces that tinkle across the floor like a miniature game of jacks.

Max kicks the door open and immediately the exit alarm sounds. The screeching siren echoes through the night and he’s sure it will bring the wrath of a dozen infected. After stepping through, he shuts the door behind them but the alarm endures. Maybe the shredder hadn’t been such a great idea after all. He takes a quick glance around outside and realizes they’re in an alley behind the station. He curses his foolishness in not reloading the shotgun and prays that one shredder will be enough to take him the distance around the building and back to the Audi where he hopes to find Brooke safely waiting. At least eight minutes had come and gone, but if he knew Brooke, her stubbornness was good for at least ten more. The journey around the building proves a struggle with Vinny in tow but is otherwise uneventful.

   The streets are still dark and quiet and Max finds himself wondering –not for the first time- what had happened to the sheriff’s staff? The only living thing in the entire building had been Lisa, if in fact that could be classified as living. It must have been vacant when she arrived, but if that was the case then how did she get infected… all good questions, which would have to wait for another time. Right now, he has a more pressing problem. The Audi and Brooke are nowhere in sight.

After Brooke exited the sheriff station and assessed the street, she headed for the Audi, repeating Max’s instructions with every step, “Connect the yellow and blue wires… yellow and blue.”

She climbed into the heap and did just that. After several false starts the car sputtered to a start as Max had promised. Brooke immediately depressed the door lock button and was pleased to see that it worked. In light of this, she mentally retracted a few choice words she’d used in regard to the car in the past. The locked doors gave her an increased sense of security. Deep down she knew that they would do little to fend off an angry infected but she was going to try and not dwell on that point right now.

Over the next five minutes, she checked her watch repeatedly, growing more and more fretful with each passing tick of the second-hand. Her hands gripped the steering wheel tight enough to leave impressions in the leather and sweat ran along her brow. She nearly jumped out of her skin when a buzzer chirped and a yellow light popped on.

“You’ve got to be kidding me!”

The “
low fuel
” indicator blared up at her mockingly. Sitting at idle had burned up the small amount of gas the car had in the tank. She wanted to scream out loud at her misfortune. Brooke also had the unfortunate knowledge that by the time the Audi told you that you were in need of gas; you were in fact already running on fumes. She had a difficult decision to make. Should she continue to wait –engine idling- and risk running out of gas at a time when the Audi was their only means of escape? What if –god forbid- Max never returned? She couldn’t push the car to a gas station. There wasn’t even one in sight. She could shut off the engine to conserve what precious fuel remained but that would again put them in an awkward position should anyone or anything be in pursuit when Max and Vinny return. The choice wasn’t clear but a decision had to be made. Brooke put the car in drive and headed down Main Street in search of gas.

***

Max stands in the parking lot of the sheriff station racked with indecision. Was Brooke okay? Had something forced her to leave? Had she really done what he’d asked and left after five minutes? The latter was possible but unlikely. It was more likely that she was in fear for her life. The prospect makes Max do a double take over his shoulder. Could the threat still be lurking out of sight? The incessant ringing of the emergency exit creeps back into Max’s train of thought and he knows that if the infected are close, the sound will certainly draw their attention.

He remembers Onan’s gold Mercedes parked a few cars down from where the Audi had been. His legs and back are beginning to strain under the weight of Vinny’s limp body. He barely makes it to the open door of the Mercedes before his legs begin to give out. He awkwardly plops Vinny down in the driver’s seat with no concern for his immediate comfort since he remains unconscious and the position is only intended to be temporary.  

Max is hoping to find that Lisa –in her haste- had left the keys in the ignition, but before he can check, his attention is drawn elsewhere. The exit alarm has suddenly stopped -more than likely an automatic reset after a predetermined length of time, but that isn’t what’s troubling Max. Now, in the absence of the mind-numbing drone of the alarm, Max can hear a choir of ominous but familiar shrieks from the halo of darkness that stretches out around him. They are still too far to see but the screams are drawing closer. There is no way to discern the exact number of voices he hears but he knows that even one is more than he can handle in his current state of exhaustion. His shotgun contains only one shredder and the thought crosses his mind that perhaps he should save it for himself.

***

After a lengthy search and two stops and starts in the Audi, Brooke has finally found what she was searching for. She pulls up to a full service pump and hears a ding as she crosses a heavy-duty black cable that stretches across the lane’s entrance. She wonders irrationally, if someone will emerge to assist but has no plans to wait and see. She reaches for the glove compartment where she knows that Vinny always keeps a credit card for fuel. She removes it and checks all windows for signs of movement. She sees none.

Brooke pulls on the door handle and tentatively pushes the door open. Reluctantly she abandons the relative safety of the vehicle and after another brief survey of the night, she proceeds to swipe Vinny’s card and waits for automatic approval at the pump. Given the current state of affairs, she holds little hope that the card reader will function but she has little to loose in trying. Miraculously her transaction is granted. She reaches for the premium unleaded in hopes that the added octane might improve upon the Audi’s sub par performance. She inserts the pump handle into the tank and engages the auto fill latch. This frees her to keep a constant 360-degree watch.

Brooke notices for the first time, that the lights inside the small gas station convenience store are on and bright. A tinge of hunger pangs her stomach and she realizes that with all that’s happened she hasn’t eaten since the previous day’s dinner. The Audi’s tank is sizeable so she knows she still has a minute before it’s filled. She also knows that it would be best not to have to stop again on their way back to the valley. She needs to get whatever supplies she can now.

Brooke goes to the car’s trunk in search of something that can be used as a weapon. She is hungry, not crazy, and there is no way she is going in there empty handed. She finds a tire iron and hopes that she will have no use for it.

She approaches the glass door of the convenience store quickly but cautiously, with the weapon raised above her head and poised to strike. She reaches the door, puts her right hand on the door handle and gives it a push. Upon opening, the door strikes a bell positioned at its top left corner and Brooke winces at the intrusive
ting ting
sound upon the silent night. ‘If I hear one more bell…’ she thinks to herself as she passes through the doorway. Instead of letting the door swing closed again and suffer another
dinner bell
she pushes it all of the way open until the hinges catch and lock it into the open position. This will also afford her a hasty retreat should the need arise.

Brooke understands that the most pressing need here is fuel for their bodies to run on so she shoves the tire iron into the waistband of her form fitting jeans and heads straight for the carbohydrate counter, stopping briefly for a hand basket on the way. She fills it with HoHos, Ding Dongs, Twinkies and cinnamon rolls. She throws in some high energy drinks for something with a little more kick and tops it off with bottled water to wash it all down.

Once satisfied with her loot she –out of habit- turns to the counter and pulls out Vinny’s card to pay. She instantly feels silly and slides Vinny’s card back into her front pocket. From her back pocket, she produces a twenty and leaves it on the counter. She hopes the twenty is enough to cover the snacks, as well as the hand basket, since no bags are in sight and she isn’t going to take the time to look for one. She heads for the door with the basket in one hand and tire iron back in the other.

A quick flash of movement -too fast to decipher- by the car startles her and makes her stumble slightly sideways bumping into the stores open door. She ducks behind a rack containing condoms, oil and various other late-night staples. Brooke tries to make herself as small as a mouse while praying that whatever was out there would go away without noticing her. Just then, the front door’s bell chimes and she realizes that she must have knocked the door loose when she bumped it.
‘Come and get it!’
the bell rings out to whoever is interested. She curses herself for being so clumsy. Whatever was out there must have heard the ringing and would be on top of her in a matter of seconds.

She peers around the end of the rack and through the bottom of the glass door that has swung shut. No movement… in fact, nothing at all but the Audi against the backdrop of a desolate night. Perhaps whatever it was has moved on. Or perhaps there had been nothing there to begin with. In any case, time was of the essence and she could spend no more of it in consternation. She grips the basket tightly, moves around the rack and toward the door. She’s met by an explosion of glass that sprays forth in every direction abrading her skin and imbedding itself in her hair.

The cause is a white haired man that has to be at least eighty-five but moves with all the grace of an Olympic gymnast. He is slightly over weight and dressed in blue oil-stained coveralls with the name ‘Steve’ stitched on his left breast pocket. His yellow-ringed eyes compliment his attire.

Steve had inexplicably dived through the unlocked door and sustained a few cuts of his own in the process, though he is apparently unfazed by it. His teeth appear red. He breathes through them like an asthmatic trying to catch his breath. His dive through the door has landed him about ten feet from it, where he now stands sniffing the air.

Upon sight of the obviously infected man, Brooke jumps like Flo’ Jo’ from the starting blocks and hits the door with her sincerest hopes that it swings both ways. For once, luck is on her side and after pushing through the door, she runs with such vigor that she is unaware of her feet ever actually touching the ground.

She clears the hood of the car and turns to the driver’s door before daring to look back at her pursuer. To her dismay, he is nowhere to be seen. She isn’t about to stop and look for him so she opens the door, tosses the hand basket into the passenger seat and she follows close behind. She connects the necessary wires and is relieved to hear the engine spring to life. She already has the car in drive with her foot off of the break before she realizes that she’s forgotten to remove the gas nozzle from the tank.

Sooner than she can consider the best course of action, she hears a loud crash overhead and the roof of the Audi creases lengthwise down the middle. The metallic crunch of the roof and desperate whine of the shocks as they rebound like pogo sticks from the concussion causes Brooke to duck her head and squint her eyes, but after a brief swerve, she manages to keep control of the car. The missing attendant had apparently returned, and in dramatic fashion. He kneels on top of the vehicle with one knee in the fold that he had just created and prepares to smash through the side window. With one mighty blow from his left fist, the front driver’s side window shatters, creating a kaleidoscope of jagged shards like deadly ice sickles. Brooke instinctively guns the engine and her assailer is sent tumbling backward off the roof of the car, across the trunk and crashing to the pavement. Simultaneously, the fuel hose is torn from its housing and gas sprays wildly from the amputated pump handle in the cars wake, wetting everything in its proximity, including Steve.

The fuel soaked attendant is instantly on his feet and running after the decrepit Audi with a deadly determination. Brooke fears that this old junker will soon serve as her coffin.

“
You piece of shit, move!
” she yells and slams the accelerator to the floor.

The car responds with an explosive backfire. Timely sparks from the Audi’s muffler set the infected and his surrounding area aflame. As if it had cleared the phlegm of old age with the boisterous backfire the Audi now digs in and squeals away down the street with the pump hose still whipping like an errant tail from its fuel door. In the rearview mirror, Steve can be seen thrashing about in agony and confusion but amazingly still on his feet as his fiery flesh drips from his body. Brooke squirms in her seat at the surreal visual and takes a mental note ‘fire seems to work’. She doesn’t stop to celebrate but does give the Audi silent thanks for saving her life. Fading into the increasingly distant background, she can see Steve on the ground and motionless, reduced to a campfire. The flames continue to spread closer to the pump and Brooke doesn’t want to be around when they finally reach it. She hopes that Max and Vinny will be outside and ok when she returns, because this town is going up in smoke. Literally.

***

Aware that time was now a short commodity Max reaches around the steering column and lets his fingers search the ignition. Nothing. Does he have time to search the car for the missing keys? He finds himself wishing he would have had the forethought to check Lisa’s dead body for the Mercedes keys and the mental image churns his stomach.

Hotwiring an old Audi was one thing but a new Mercedes is far beyond his casual knowledge. He would have to find another car or spend time searching this car far a spare key. After a quick check in a few obvious locations, Max decides the search for a key to be a lost cause and raises his head in order to locate more suitable transportation.

The cries are getting closer so whatever vehicle is nearest will have to do. He spots a Ford Taurus across the street and though it’s far, he determines it to be his best bet.

Max slings Vinny over his shoulder once again and using a little adrenaline of his own moves as fast as he can across the street. He is halfway to the car when he sees the first of the infected, a teenager dressed in baggy jeans. He is shirtless with his pants sagging -so low that they defy gravity- and checkered boxers clearly visible above his beltline. The teen is carrying something red and white in one hand that Max cannot quite make out at this distance.

Max hears another infected approaching him from behind and closing inhumanly fast. He spins in time to catch it with an off balance one-handed blast from the shotgun. The weight of the gun coupled with fatigue push his aim low but the shredder still manages to prune one leg from the wretch and it skids sideways on its face picking up pieces of asphalt in its eye and cheek as it slides. A geyser of blood streams from the deputy’s freshly amputated stump and Max stops wondering what happened in the sheriff’s station. With his shotgun now empty, he turns back to the Taurus only to find yet another infected. This one is standing directly between Max and his salvation. Its head is cocked hard to one side, which leaves its neck at an incomprehensible ninety-degree angle. At the apex of its fracture is a bluish bulge about the size of an orange. Max is dumbfounded by how the creature continues to move. Someone had obviously hit it in the head or neck with great force in order to cause such damage, but still, here it stands between Max, Vinny and precious life.