Infection: Alaskan Undead Apocalypse

• Title Page
  
• Part One
  
• Chapter 1
  
• Chapter 2
  
• Chapter 3
  
• Chapter 4
  
• Chapter 5
  
• Chapter 6
  
• Chapter 7
  
• Chapter 8
  
• Chapter 9
  
• Chapter 10
  
• Chapter 11
  
• Chapter 12
  
• Chapter 13
  
• Chapter 14
  
• Chapter 15
  
• Chapter 16
  
• Chapter 17
  
• Chapter 18
  
• Chapter 19
  
• Part Two
  
• Chapter 20
  
• Chapter 21
  
• Chapter 22
  
• Chapter 23
  
• Chapter 24
  
• Chapter 25
  
• Chapter 26
  
• Part Three
  
• Chapter 27
  
• Chapter 28
  
• Chapter 29
  
• Chapter 30
  
• Chapter 31
  
• Chapter 32
  
• Chapter 33
  
• Chapter 34
  
• Chapter 35
  
• Chapter 36
  
• Chapter 37
  
• Chapter 38
  
• Chapter 39
  
• Chapter 40
  
• Chapter 41
  
• Chapter 42
  
• Chapter 43
  
• Chapter 44
  
• Chapter 45
  
• Chapter 46
  
• Chapter 47
  
• Chapter 48
  
• Chapter 49
  
• Chapter 50
  
• Chapter 51
  
• Chapter 52
  
• Chapter 53
  
• Chapter 54
  
• Chapter 55
  
• Chapter 56
  
• Chapter 57
  
• Chapter 58
  
• Chapter 59
  
• Epilogue
  

Infection: Alaskan Undead Apocalypse

Sean Schubert

Published by Permuted Press at Smashwords.

Copyright 2010, 2012 Sean Schubert.

www.PermutedPress.com

This book is dedicated to my loving

and supporting family—all of you.

“I love coming up here! Alaska is my favorite place in the whole world.”

Little Martin Houser truly meant what he said when he repeated his revelation, for what seemed to be the one-hundredth time. He loved coming to Alaska with his family. He was the only one in his class who had ever been to such a distinctly different place. At first, he didn’t really know what the big deal was. It was just a place after all. The more that he heard people talk about this place, however, the more he accepted that Alaska held some kind of magic. His family had been coming to Alaska every two or three years since he was born—meaning that he was now in Alaska for his fourth time.

They stayed in a beautiful deluxe cabin. There were three bedrooms, a large great room with an enormous stone-faced fireplace, a beautiful solarium off the main room, and indoor flushing toilets. This was an amenity that his mother had always remarked as the most important feature of the cabin. Personally, Martin didn’t see the big deal. He was able to do all that he needed outside in the woods, and usually did. It had just become a part of the grand experience for him. There was a loft area above the bedrooms, electricity from a very large diesel powered generator housed in a small shack outside, and even a satellite dish for television. It was better than their house.

This was an especially good year for Martin because he had been allowed to invite a friend. The decision was, not surprisingly, made the moment the opportunity was presented to Martin. He knew exactly whom he would like to bring: Danny Mahoney.

It was Danny Mahoney’s first trip to Alaska, but given that he was only ten years old, he was years ahead of most visitors to the state, who often didn’t find time in their lives to visit the state until after retirement. He and Martin were best friends from playing on the same soccer team for the past two years. Martin’s family, all five of them including Martin, were nice and generous and had readily welcomed Danny to travel with them, all except Alec, Martin’s older brother, that is.

Martin’s dad, Mr. Houser, was an ordinary man of ordinary height, ordinary weight, wore ordinary clothes, had an ordinary job, and led an ordinary life. Most people would consider him average, if not a little less than average, in all things in life. He was, however, pleasant and willing to spend time with Martin and Danny and any other kids that might be around; something many adults weren’t willing to do. Danny liked Mr. Houser and trusted him.

Mrs. Houser, Ginny, was anything but ordinary. She was about as tall as her husband but about twice his size. She was loud and easily excited and always laughing with loud, contagious, storm bursts of laughter, full of life and enthusiasm. She always smelled sweet and inviting; a combination of her ample perfume and the treats that were always in her pockets, purse, hands, or mouth. At soccer games, she always brought the best after game snacks and was known for that by all the other kids on the team.

Martin’s brother, Alec, was older by five years, tall, thin, and athletic. He played basketball all the time and teased Martin and Danny for being too short to play basketball, and for having had to settle with playing soccer of all things. In public, Martin and Danny both chafed at the insults and resented Alec, but in private they both secretly admired him and looked up to him. That admiration made it that much harder to accept Alec’s barbed comments. Alec didn’t wear really baggy clothes like a lot of his friends wore, or, more to the point; his parents wouldn’t let him wear clothes like that. He compromised, though, by wearing a series of loose fitting licensed replica basketball jerseys and buying his jeans a size too big. That was as baggy as it got with him, which was just fine as far as he was concerned. It was harder to play a sudden impromptu game if he was wearing baggy jeans.

Martin’s sister, Julie, or Jules as everyone called her, was two years younger than him. Alec had overheard a conversation once between his parents and some family friends in which Jules was referred to as a mistake. Jules was small and pretty with longish dark hair and blue eyes that usually precipitated second and sometimes a third looks from people. Her eyes were absolutely electric with life. Jules usually tagged along with Martin and Danny, which was just fine with them. She made the two of them three.

The three of them were currently running a roughly cut path through small trees and thick brush. Below them and to their right was a gray and gravelly creek bed through which coursed an equally gray and gravelly near frigid stream of melting glacial water.

To Martin, the only one of the three of them who could credibly claim to remember, it seemed that they should have already found the glacier. Had it melted? Was it all gone? He bragged about his experiences on and around this small arm of the Crenshaw Glacier. Now, with the glacier gone, would it appear that he had been only telling stories? Lies? Nervously, he started chewing on his lower lip as he ran. Where was it?

And then, there it was; part of it anyway. He could see a narrow spit of ice that thrust itself into the flowing water, as if it were the glacier’s tongue lapping at the currents. Around a bend in front of them, he could finally see a substantial sea of dirty frosty white against a backdrop of green and brown. When they got closer, they could see the deep blue hue of the dense ice as it refracted the sun’s light.

“What’s that smell?” crowed Jules through her sudden grimace.

It was an awful odor, worse than the manure smell from back home in Minnesota and worse than that rotten fish smell at the piers down in Seward. A faint breeze helped to thin it enough for them to continue on.

Danny suggested, “Smells like somethin’ died. We probably oughta watch out for bears.”

Almost on cue, both Martin and Danny took their small pocketknives from their front pockets and bared their shiny blades. Jules picked up a stick and held it at the ready.

“What’s that?” asked Jules, pointing at a black mass partially encased in the receding ice.

“Probably where that smell is comin’ from,” Martin thought out loud.

And then they did what kids do. They went down to the dark mass and closer to the odor to investigate and possibly poke it with Jules’ stick. Down near the creek bed and without the benefit of the breeze, the odor was nearly unbearable.

Jules, through her hand cupped over her nose and mouth, said, “It looks like a person.”

“It does kind of look like a person,” Danny agreed, “but how could a person be in the middle of this big hunk of ice?”

Martin suddenly lit up with delight. “Maybe it’s a caveman or something. Maybe we’re gonna be famous. Jules, you got your camera with you?”

Proud of herself for being prepared to contribute to their fame, she beamed, “Sure do,” and produced the silver digital camera from her backpack.

Danny asked, “How long d’ya think it’s been in there?”

Trying to sound authoritative and intelligent, Martin posited, “He’s probably been in there since the last ice age. Probably thousands of years.”

“Thousands of years,” Jules echoed.

Danny walked up and looked a little closer at the exposed upper torso, upper arms from the shoulders down to just above the elbows, and head. He had no hair and didn’t appear to have any clothes. His skin was as grey as a stormy sky, with blue veins that crackled across his arms like lightning. On the left side of his neck was a terrible tear in the grey flesh that exposed the black tissue underneath. “Looks like he’s really starting to rot. Maybe something took a bite outta him too.”

By this time, Jules had started taking pictures. Danny, getting his nerve up a little, stood right next to the find and smiled for a snap. With the blue-white flash of the camera still spreading itself out over and around the glacier like an echo, Danny was forced to duck out of harm’s way as Martin swung Jules’ stick at him. The blow went wide and landed on the ice just to the left of their caveman.

“Careful Marty,” Jules warned, “you might hurt him or something. Maybe we should go get Mom and Dad.”

“Okay, but if Alec is there we don’t tell him. Deal?”

The other two agreed enthusiastically.

Martin, as a last measure of his feat, decided that he too should be photographed next to their find, if only for posterity’s sake. He walked over and stood right next to the frozen figure and smiled. It was a big cheesy smile that stretched all the way from their home in the Midwest to there in Alaska.

Jules held the camera up and thought she saw something that was just out of the digital frame. She lowered the camera and looked more closely. Nothing. Lifting the camera back up, she snapped another picture. But this time, as the flash momentarily partially blinded everyone, something did move. At first, Martin thought that it was just Danny swinging the same stick at him, but when the teeth came down on his shoulder he knew better.

The bite didn’t break through his two shirts, but when Martin recoiled and raised his hand to fend off the attack he squealed out in pain. The frozen man was lunging desperately, hungrily at Martin. And when he got hold of Martin’s hand, he bit down hard, driving one of his few jagged, brown teeth into Martin’s soft, white skin.

His movements became more frantic, as he obviously tried to free himself and keep a tight hold of Martin’s hand. Danny came to the rescue, striking at the man’s head until he forced it to loosen its grip. Seemingly enraged, Martin’s attacker started to literally quake in the icy grip that still held it firmly, if temporarily, in place.

Martin fell onto his back on the grey, silty beach, clutching at his hand and crying pitifully, blood spilling onto his other hand and down his front, individual spots of crimson gradually forming into a single dark patch that covered his grey Alaska t-shirt.

Danny, still holding the stick at the ready, said over his shoulder, “Jules, get him to his feet and let’s get going. Jules, now.”

Shaken from her stupor, Jules gathered Martin up to his feet and helped him up onto the ledge overlooking the creek. Danny was quickly on their heels, stick still in hand.