Apocalyptic Moon (After the Bane)
Thank you for purchasing this publication of The Wild Rose Press, Inc.
Apocalyptic Moon
by
Eva Gordon
After the Bane, Book One
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales, is entirely coincidental.
Apocalyptic Moon
COPYRIGHT © 2013 by Eva Gordon
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission of the author or The Wild Rose Press, Inc. except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.
Contact Information: [email protected]
Cover Art by
Rae Monet, Inc. Design
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Publishing History
First Black Rose Edition, 2013
Print ISBN 978-1-61217-737-3
Digital ISBN 978-1-61217-738-0
After the Bane, Book One
Published in the United States of America
Dedication
To those who live off the grid.
Chapter 1
At the nurses’ station, Dr. Dora Adler took a break and poured herself a mug of fresh coffee. She added crème and swirled until it was the right light-mocha color before that first glorious sip. “Yumm.” Everything tasted good today. All things did, on one’s last day on earth. She glanced at the calendar for the umpteenth time. May 13, her birthday/death day. Along with Kurt Cobain, Jimmy Hendrix, and Amy Winehouse, she was a member of the 27 Club. She came from a long line of first-born women who died on the day or within days of their twenty-seventh birthday. Her father insisted it was just a horrible coincidence. Of course it was. Cancer and strokes were heredity, not day of death. You didn’t have to be a doctor to understand that. Still, her grandmother, mother and maternal ancestors four generations back were unwilling members of the 27 Club. Mere chance? Weird karma? Or just a self-destructive method to avoid paying student loans?
Hmm. No time to complete a bucket list, but at least she’d make time for a last meal. That new five star French restaurant a few blocks away would serve a hell of a final dinner.
Why not max out my credit card with their finest wine, ooh, and chocolate mousse?
The intercom interrupted her dark thoughts. “Dr. Fellman, report to the ER.”
She slammed her cup down, splattering coffee on the counter. She grabbed a napkin and wiped the mess.
Freakin’ nerves!
Carla Manders swiped her badge in the pin entry clock. “Dr. Adler, I can’t believe you came in on your birthday, but I’m glad you did. We’re shorthanded.”
Dora bit her lower lip and then smiled at the twenty-year veteran head nurse. “Birthday or not, I can’t bear to miss out on the Friday night ER bedlam.” Dora’s supervisor, Dr. Grover, gave her the day off. Most fatigued residents would have jumped out of an airplane for a day off. Not Dr. Dora Adler. Better than her bucket list and last meals, she loved medicine and helping people. Why not spend her last day on earth as a physician? Besides, her family lived far away and there wasn’t a hot boyfriend to wine and dine her. Actually, the way things were going with the Z-phage pandemic, this might be the end of days for everybody. Would being a zombie still qualify her to be in the 27 Club? Kind of dead, but not. Worse, eaten alive.
Get a grip! Focus on patients.
Dwelling on such nonsense, especially now with the zombie apocalypse, was at best narcissistic, at worst, turning into a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Carla looked up from her patient chart. “Tonight’s the full moon and on top of that people are keeping our phone lines tied up asking about the Ultra vaccine.”
“Still? The so-called zombie vaccine doesn’t work.” The just released vaccine was a glorified flu shot and cost two hundred dollars a pop. The major pharmaceutical companies made a nice profit off people’s desperation and fear. The virus appeared four months ago, and it would take years to design the vaccine, despite the fact nations worked twenty-four seven on finding the cure.
Carla scoffed. “My cousin in Miami had the vaccine, but she still turned.”
“Even the Surgeon General said it wouldn’t work, though she reassured it will prevent several strains of flu. Now how comforting is that?” Dora quipped.
Carla shook her head and answered the phone. She rolled her eyes and mouthed, “Vaccine request.”
Dora glanced at her watch and stretched her back before pouring herself another cup of brew. She’d been up since 6:00 a.m. and it was almost noon. Yep, still alive. She scanned the patient whiteboard. Nothing out of the ordinary. Morning rounds were uneventful as well, and thankfully, no new Z-phage patients. In the last three days, she’d identified two infected still in the very early stages of the zombie disease. Odd as it was, her intuition about things such as diagnosing diseases had increased during the last two weeks. She hated singling out the newly infected. Once identified, they were sedated and quarantined. She never saw those patients again. Before they
turned,
guards escorted them off to the secured underground confinement area in the hospital’s basement. No one ever returned from the zombie isolation ward, run by the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID) and contract mercenaries.
“Dr. Adler, you’re needed in the briefing room,” said Carla with a teasing smile.
Dora gave her a guarded look and headed around the corner.
Please don’t let this be a surprise party
. Who even thought about celebrations? More likely, another meeting about zombies.
The mysterious virus was just one of many disasters making headlines. Since the last election there had been one major earthquake in Southern California, two category four hurricanes that plowed the Carolinas, tornadoes in the heartland, one nuclear meltdown in Arkansas, and yet another economic collapse. More unemployed, and the starving homeless, without medical insurance filled the streets. Given the ripe environment, Z-phage infestation flourished. And that was just the United States. Would it be so bad if she died? Death became a better choice than rising as a flesh-eating ghoul.
Behind the briefing room wall, shuffling steps stopped her from turning the doorknob. Zombie survival rule number one: listen for monotonous moans accompanying shuffling steps. She pressed her ear to the door. None.
Rule number two: sniff the air. She inhaled. No rotting odor. Though, new zombies never smelled bad. That is, if prior to being bitten they remembered to apply deodorant.
Inside someone whispered, “Shh.”
New rule: zombies never hush one another. She twisted the doorknob and entered the darkened room.
“Surprise! Happy Birthday,” cheered the staff crowded in the room and all the lights switched on.
She jumped and her heart raced, not so much from the actual surprise, but from all the attention directed at her. A “Happy Birthday” sign hung on the wall. Balloons made of surgical gloves and a huge chocolate cake shaped like a heart, a real heart, sat in the middle of the conference table. The cardio cake adorned with twenty-seven candles and an extra one in the center of the ventricle looked gruesomely delicious. The anatomical themed party included a brain-shaped gelatin mold, kidney shaped cookies, and a bowl of red fruit punch served in lab specimen cups.
Ooh. Gross.
She smiled
. My kind of people
. “Oh my God! How did you guys know I was coming in?”
Dr. Frank Grover laughed. “As soon as you told me you decided to come in, I made calls.”
Calls?
I don’t think the local bakery designs organ cakes
. She gave him a pointed glance. She’d not expected her no-nonsense boss to initiate a party. “If I’d known, I wouldn’t have dressed in scrubs.” She laughed. “Maybe my new lilac ones.” Actually, she couldn’t remember the last time she wore a nice outfit. She had a sexy little black dress for a cocktail party she didn’t attend, because she was called for duty. It hung in her closet with the price tag still attached.
Her friend and marathon-running partner, Dr. Janelle Smith lit the candles. “Come on, girlfriend. Make a wish.”
She raised her brow. Should she wish she could live to be twenty-eight or even eighty? How about something even more unattainable? “I wish for the perfect man.”
Anne laughed. “And he looks like…”
Dora furrowed her brow. “A nerd who can live with a diagnostician without being grossed out when you discuss your day over sushi
.” Someone who can handle being a widower, she mused. Like Dad.
Janelle pulled out a paperback from her pocket that Dora had been secretly reading. She waved the cover of a bare-chested muscular hunk sweeping a half-naked woman on to his dragon ship. Dora’s face flamed. No, not
My Viking Master
. Reading cheesy romance novels was her secret peccadillo.
Damn, my new e-reader is still in its box. After all, I bought it so no one would find out I love naughty novels.
Everyone needed an escape. Janelle grinned. “You mean a nerd like this.” Fortunately, she handed Dora the small book before others could see it.
She stuck it in her large pocket. “I found that book in my lupus patient’s room. I meant to return it but…”
Janelle bumped Dora’s shoulder in play. “Uh-huh. That’s okay. After you’re done, I’d like to borrow it.”
Dr. Grover glanced at his watch. “Let me slice everyone a piece. It’s Friday the thirteenth and tonight’s a full moon. Enjoy the quiet while we can.”
“Cut me the aortic arch,” quipped Dora.
Elaine shook her head and laughed. “I’m in surgery, but that’s gruesome, even for me.”
Dora chewed a morsel. “Ooh, yum. Really good.”
She raised her voice, “Thank you for the zombie-themed birthday party. Quite timely.”
A huge card signed by the staff and several gifts rested on a corner table. But before she opened the presents, the invited personnel left after birthday cardio cake to go about their duties. Only Dr. Grover and Janelle who had a later shift in Pediatrics remained.
Janelle turned on the news. “Sorry I can’t help myself. I heard the president is going to talk. Again.”
Dora stared at the screen and her heart sank. Los Angeles is in flames. Another ZFM or zombie flash mobbing YouTube video gone viral. Violent computer games long forgotten, as kids turned to the bloody reality of killing real zombies and
ZFM
became a global craze.
Nothing shocked her anymore. Since the first outbreaks, social networks announced how to attract zombies to bash their brains out. Young people from Europe to China and now Africa, South America and Australia took to the streets with clubs, axes, guns and machetes. The millions of unemployed, homeless and disenfranchised formed vigilante groups to fight the zombie invasion. After a good killing, many would loot and grab free food. The most popular TV reality shows were
Zombie Survival
and the over the top
Zombies and Tiaras
. The National Guard, curfews and all the pleading from politicians did no good. A new political party, The End of Days party, began a grassroots organization that blamed Z-phage on sinners.
CNN Nightly News newscaster, Virginia Hayes, broadcasting from Los Angeles reported the latest news. No longer the perfectly made up and coifed newscaster, she looked exhausted, with bags under her eyes. She wore a bloodied blazer and an AK-47 rested on her desk. “I’m afraid the tide has turned. The zombies now outnumber the zombie flash mobs and Los Angeles is on the brink of destruction. I’ve been in Iraq and Somalia during the heat of war and I’ve never seen anything that even compares to what we’re seeing now. The disease has spread like wildfire and panic has brought the highways to a complete standstill.”