Sometimes We Ran (Book 1)
A Story From the Zombie Apocalypse
This book is for sale at
http://leanpub.com/SometimesWeRan
This version was published on 2013-05-23
* * * * *
This is a
Leanpub
book. Leanpub empowers authors and publishers with the Lean Publishing process.
Lean Publishing
is the act of publishing an in-progress ebook using lightweight tools and many iterations to get reader feedback, pivot until you have the right book and build traction once you do.
* * * * *
© 2013 Stephen Drivick
To Mom for always telling me to take chances.
How It All Started
“It’s not the end of the world.”
Dennis Armstrong murmured to himself as he crossed into the ornate lobby of his Dallas hotel. He had just gotten in from a business trip to Paris, and he was beat. His flight had been diverted twice: once for a sick pilot, and another time for some trouble with the plane’s engines. Dennis spent two hours in the terminal of some out-of-the-way airport in Spain with a crazy lady running around screaming and attacking people. He even tried to calm her down, and all he got for his trouble was a gaping hole in his arm where she bit him. The large-breasted airport security lady had apologized profusely as she bandaged the wound. The urge to scratch under the bandage was driving him crazy, but he knew he had to leave it alone or it wouldn’t heal. Dennis would worry about it later. Right now, he just hoped the hotel still had his reservation.
It was all worth it though, because tomorrow Dennis was going to be a very rich man. He sold used computer parts to customers around the world. His business partner and best friend, Jeff, had come up with this great idea to take apart broken computers and resell the good components. They started the company last year, with Jeff as the technical guy and Dennis as the sales muscle. Dennis was really good at selling stuff. Whether it was cars or refrigerators or used computer parts, Dennis could always talk them into buying more.
The French deal had been very lucrative, but the upcoming Chinese deal was going to blow it out of the water. Dennis had convinced some Chinese businessmen to buy most of his stock at a considerable profit. With this deal, Dennis might be able to take the rest of the year off. All he had to do was impress them at tomorrow’s meeting and he was all set.
Right now though, all he wanted to do was lie down for a little sleep. He had started feeling sick on the plane and now, here in Dallas, he felt worse. Even now he could feel his sinuses closing up, and his throat was a little sore. He just needed a little sleep and aspirin, and then he would be good as new in the morning.
“Next?”
Dennis walked up to the hotel’s check-in desk with his credit card in hand. He handed the card to the cute brunette clerk who was smiling ear to ear. Dennis attempted some small talk. “Hey. How’s it going?”
“It’s going great,” she said with a little Texas drawl. “Okay Mr. Armstrong. We have a single room with a king-sized bed and no smoking. Right?”
“Right. Put it on my company credit card.” He noticed her name was Cindi.
Her shirt was unbuttoned at the top, showing her wonderful cleavage as she typed like a madman on the desk terminal. Dennis thought he might invite her back to his room for a little post-business-deal romp in the sack. It would have to be after the deal though.
Business before pleasure, you know.
Cindi, the bodacious hotel clerk, handed Dennis back his credit card. “Okay, Mr. Armstrong. Your room is 1021. It’s on the tenth floor.” She put the electronic keys in a small paper folder, wrote the number down, and then handed it to Dennis. “Do you need any help with your bags?”
“No, I can manage. Thanks.” His attention turned to the flat-screen television hanging on the wall behind Cindi. It was tuned into one of the cable news channels. The Egyptians were at it again. The screen was plastered with horrible scenes of sand-colored tanks attacking buildings and stern-faced soldiers clashing with civilians on the streets of Cairo. It looked like a real mess.
Dennis started getting his bags together. “How long has that been going on in Egypt?” he asked Cindi.
The pretty hotel clerk looked at the screen. “Oh, the Egypt thing. It’s been going on all day. Terrible stuff. There were even reports of people biting each other. Imagine that.”
“Biting?” Dennis walked away, shaking his head and rubbing his own bite wound. He never heard of people biting each other in a civil war.
The ride up to the tenth floor was uneventful, but by the time Dennis got to his room, he knew he was sick. The general aches and pains in his tired body had become little swords of fire in his joints. His sinuses were now full and hurting, and his skin was warm and clammy with fever. He felt like death.
After two tries, Dennis finally got the key to work. He stepped inside the room, and found it adequate.
Usually, when Dennis got to his hotel room, he would crank the air conditioning, flick on the TV, and kick back and relax. However, all he wanted to do now was curl up on the king-sized bed, and go to sleep. The AC would stay off tonight. Even though Dennis was burning with a low-grade fever, he was chilled to the bone.
Dennis threw his bags on the floor, kicked off his expensive shoes, and sat on the bed. He was so cold all of a sudden. He pulled the comforter off the bed, and wrapped it around his shoulders. It warmed him up a little bit, but he still shivered. It was time for a little medicine.
Dennis got up off the bed, and moved stiffly towards his luggage on the floor. He extracted his sweat pants, a white undershirt, his toiletries, and a large bottle of aspirin. Dennis was going to change, and then get some sleep.
Dennis moved slowly to the bathroom. He felt like an old man as he walked. This flu was really killing him. A couple of times, he had to stop and steady himself when he felt dizzy. He made it to the bathroom, changed into his sweats and undershirt, and took some of the generic aspirin. He was even able to brush his teeth and swirl a little mouthwash to kill the horrible sick taste in his mouth. He spit, and then looked at himself in the mirror.
“Jesus Christ!”
Dennis looked horrible. His skin had an awful gray pallor, and his eyes had turned a little red. He touched his face, not believing the reflection looking back at him. In the harsh light of the tiny hotel bathroom, he looked like some sort of monster. Dennis then felt a sneeze coming on.
He grabbed a tissue just as the sneeze exploded from his nose and throat. As he sneezed, he felt something slide out his nose, and land in the tissue. It also dripped onto the counter, and into the sink. Dennis blew his nose, coughed a little, then pulled the tissue away from his face to see the damage.
The tissue was covered in blood.
Dennis yelped and put the tissue back to his nose. It was still bleeding lightly. He was beginning to panic. He tried to make himself walk out to the phone and call for help, but he couldn’t seem to make his legs work. Instead, he sat on the toilet lid with a tissue on his nose trying to stop the nosebleed.
After about fifteen minutes, the bleeding stopped. Dennis felt weak and very sick, but he thought he’d be okay. The worst seemed to be over. He dragged himself out of the bathroom and lay down on the bed. He was burning with fever, and his mind was fuzzy. It was hard to focus.
Dennis found the television remote, and turned on the rather large flat-screen in the room. He flipped around checking out all the channels. The crisis in Egypt dominated the news. The situation had gotten worse, and the military had now declared martial law. Some recorded footage showed bloodied civilians swarming a government outpost. The attackers were biting some of the soldiers. Egypt had gone to hell.
Dennis flipped around to some other channels. There was more weird news; China was in the grip of a huge blackout, some city in Russia was having a civil emergency, and in London there were reports of some maniac in a subway station who was biting people on the neck. The whole world had gone nuts.
Dennis flipped around till he found a boring old movie. It was just the thing to put him to sleep so he could rest. Before he went to dreamland, he decided to call his business partner Jeff, who was flying in tomorrow for the meeting. Dennis knew he was too sick to meet the Chinese guys.
It took all of Dennis’s strength to dial his cellphone. The numbers swam before his eyes. After about threes tries, he finally dialed Jeff’s number. His voice mail picked up.
After the beep, Dennis left his message. “Yeah… hey Jeff. It’s Dennis. I’m in Dallas. Look, I… I, uh, I’m sick with some sort of flu. You’ll have to meet the Chinese guys by yourself tomorrow, okay? Just come up to room 1021 and get the sales presentation. You’ll do okay. The Chinese dudes like you. If I feel better, I’ll join you. Okay? Any uh, questions, just give me a call.” It took all of Dennis’s concentration to leave the message. His mind was so foggy. He felt truly awful, and was feeling worse by the minute. Dennis felt weak, stuffed up, and wrung out.
He was also consumed by hunger.
It wasn’t a normal hunger. Dennis almost felt like he was starving. It was almost like he was dying. It clawed at him like a wild animal. Dennis had never felt anything quite like this. He was even salivating.
Dennis rolled over and tried to sleep. The fever had gotten worse, and he could taste blood in his mouth. “Just got to get some sleep. I’ll be okay in the morning,” Dennis said to himself, as he turned off the light. It would be the last words he ever spoke before drifting off into a deep, dreamless slumber.
Many hours later, Dennis was up and walking around the room. Except it wasn’t quite Dennis anymore. He had died a few minutes after midnight. It had been a tortuous death, full of fever, low moaning, bleeding, and convulsions. After a few hours of suffering, he finally stopped breathing and laid quiet.
Dennis stayed dead for about eighteen minutes.
At about twenty minutes past midnight, the body that had formerly been Dennis rose from the king-sized bed and started walking around the hotel room. He shambled around making a low groaning sound. There was no pulse, no heartbeat, and very slow and shallow breathing.
He was hungry.
The dead body that had been Dennis walked around the room looking for a meal. The hunger began to consume him, so he started moaning louder. By this time, his eyes were glowing a sinister red.
It was now after eight o’ clock in the morning, and the city was waking up. The sunlight streamed in through the open blinds, and filled the room with light. The intense, morning light hurt the creature’s eyes. It turned away from the window and faced the door.
“Housekeeping!” A maid called out from the hallway. She had a heavy Russian accent. The walking corpse perked up its ears, and then lifted its head to catch a scent. It took a long sniff, and the maid’s scent filled its nostrils. It could smell her flesh. It even caught a good whiff of her blood. It was a wonderful smell. Salty, a little like the ocean. The creature began to salivate in anticipation of some tasty meat.
The corpse that had formerly been Dennis Armstrong, star salesman, walked towards the door. It curled its lip up in a smirk, till it looked like a little smile. The meal was on the other side, just waiting to be eaten.
The lock beeped, and the handle started to turn. The maid was coming in. After all, the “Do Not Disturb” sign was not on the door. The creature waited for the right time to strike.
The maid opened the door, and walked in with her vacuum cleaner ready. She was looking down, getting her supplies out. “Housekeeping. I clean now,” she said, looking up to speak to the hotel guest. She had been taught by management to look guests in the eye. The maid took one look at those cold, dead eyes and started to scream. She was cut short by teeth ripping into her throat. The creature pulled the limp body of the maid into the hotel room, and began to feed in peace.
The zombie apocalypse had come to the United States.
