Infection: Alaskan Undead Apocalypse (9 page)

When a voice suddenly began to speak from the radio, everyone in Neil’s van was caught off guard. It had been silent for so long Neil had forgotten that he had left it on.

“...Emergency Information Broadcast to follow...”
A series of familiar beeps and tones then filled the expectant silence as they waited for news...any news.

Another voice, this one sounding more human and less recorded than the previous, began,
“Attention Anchorage. This message is being broadcast from the newly established National Guard checkpoint at the Knik Bridge. A dire state of emergency has been declared for Anchorage and the rest of Southcentral Alaska.

“Reports of widespread destruction of public and private property and potential homicides are true. It is recommended that all residents remain at home. Lock all doors and stay clear of windows. Do not, I repeat, do not attempt to evacuate. Escape routes north and south are currently blocked. If you are already on either the Glenn or Seward Highways, please lock your doors and remain in your cars. Authorities will come to you and escort you safely out.

“The Governor has mobilized the Alaska State National Guard to try and contain the disturbance. At this point, authorities are unsure of the identities of the perpetrators, their resources, or their intentions. Anyone with any information about this group or their leaders is encouraged to contact authorities immediately. The Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Department of Homeland Security have been asked to share assistance in bringing this disturbance to a quick close. Security personnel have also been dispatched to secure the Trans-Alaska Pipeline against any potential threats.”

Neil said quietly, “They think this is a bunch of terrorists with some kind of political agenda. They haven’t got a clue.”

The voice continued,
“If you feel that your safety is at all compromised, a list of safe emergency collection sites will follow. If you are able, remain at home and wait for the authorities to resolve this situation. We will continue to broadcast developments as they are reported.”

More instructions, some speculation, and lists of potential safe sites followed the broadcast. Neil looked in the rearview mirror and caught Jerry’s eyes. “They don’t know what’s happening, do they?”

“No.”

“Jesus.”

“And if they don’t figure it out sooner rather than later, this thing will get completely outta control.”

“And then?”

Jerry remembered one of the only lines he could recall from a World Literature class he took, “Abandon all hope.”

Rachel shifted her weight in the passenger seat so that she could turn and face Neil and Jerry. “If they don’t figure it out...they? What about us? We’re in the middle of it and I don’t have a clue as to what’s going on. Will somebody please tell me! And why the hell aren’t we going to one of those safe sites?”

Reluctantly, Jerry answered, “Those safe sites will act like magnets for those things. They’ll be drawn to the noise, the movement and the smells. We’ll be safer if we just keep moving.”

Still not quite sure what to think or even believe, Rachel nodded her head for lack of any better gesture. She checked her cell phone again and was told once again that all circuits were busy and to please try her call again later. She hoped that her boyfriend was safe. He was a firefighter assigned to Station Four on Tudor Road. If she could just speak with him, she might be able to calm down at least a little bit. His voice and his demeanor usually had a calming effect on her. She needed that right now. She needed to feel safe.

Jules and Danny grew tired of all the grownup talk. They looked out the side windows at all the businesses and houses they passed. Jules looked over at her companion and asked, “What happened to my mom and dad? Where is Martin? When will we be back with them? Are we still going to be home in time to start school or do you think we might be able to miss a few days?”

Danny said without moving his eyes, “I think you might be getting an extended summer vacation, Jules.”

“Well I guess that’s alright then. I was going to be in Mrs. Dumont’s class and I hear she’s mean.”

Neil led them from Northern Lights Boulevard and turned south on Minnesota Drive, a wide major thoroughfare that connected downtown Anchorage and South Anchorage. His intention was to take Minnesota to South Anchorage and then continue further south on the Old Seward Highway as far as he was able before getting onto the New Seward Highway.

They began to pass motorists who were still carrying on with their normal routines, oblivious to the calamity that was unfolding. Neil flashed his headlights at cars that sped in the opposite direction as him, but his efforts went largely unnoticed. The only responses he did get were bewildered stares, waving smiles, and obscene hand gestures.

Minnesota Drive started its trek out of downtown Anchorage heading south, but upon reaching the south side, it abruptly changed course toward the east. The uninterrupted highway drive ended at the intersection with the Old Seward Highway. They came to that traffic light and waited for just a second as Neil assessed the possibility of getting on the New Seward Highway and hightailing it out of town. In front of them, they could see the overpass where the New Seward Highway crossed over Minnesota. There were cars, largely motionless, lined up bumper to bumper for as far as they were able to see. Neil was suddenly concerned that he’d made a fatal error in judgment. Maybe they should have headed north instead. Maybe they could have gotten on the Glenn Highway ahead of the majority of the cars that now were blocking it.

Just as they turned right onto the Old Seward Highway and continued their trek south, Jerry watched as, like a snowball growing exponentially as it rolled down hill, a surge of drivers and passengers abandoned their vehicles and started to run. Jerry touched Neil’s shoulder and pointed to the commotion.

The group watched for just a heartbeat. Like spooked cattle, the motorists stampeded south along the elevated highway. Some along the outside of the lanes were forced over the guard railing on the overpass and others simply jumped for lack of any better options. Of course, not far behind were the predators that were tracking them. The blaring of car horns was replaced by shrieks of terror. The din rose until it became a single, desperate scream.

They didn’t need to see anymore, but Meghan, who had only been told what was happening and hadn’t actually witnessed any of it, paused her car briefly. She was speechless. It resembled the images she had seen on CNN of the Running of the Bulls in Pamplona, Spain.

One man, carrying a small child, started to climb over the railing to flee down the grassy slope. He got one leg over and then was jolted back from something behind him. He pulled himself forward and then, to everyone’s astonishment, threw the child, who couldn’t have been more than three years old. The child hit the grassy incline and rolled down, looking like a ball of flailing legs and arms. Meghan started to pull her car out of its turn to go retrieve the child, but stopped herself when she saw three others leap over the railing and follow the child. The three following didn’t appear to be doing so out of concern. Their body language spoke much more like hunters than rescuers. She couldn’t bring herself to watch anymore. All she felt was disgust with herself for having done nothing. She turned her car south, rejoined Neil in his flight, and refused to look back again, even when they entered a mixed residential and commercial section of road that completely obscured the highway from view.

It was in this area that she heard and then felt the first sputter from her car’s engine. She knew immediately that her car and its failing fuel pump were choosing today to challenge her patience. Her boyfriend, actually her fiancée but they had been engaged for so long that she doubted they’d ever be married, had promised several times to fix it for her. But just like his promise of marriage, this one had gone no further than mere words. She felt herself getting angry with him and even imagined the argument and the excuses. She caught herself in her imaginings though and was overcome with concern for him all at once. For all his faults, and he had a few, he was a genuinely good guy to her and didn’t actually intend to let her down.

He was the night manager of the Tesoro 2Go Mart on Tudor; down near the native hospital...not that far off from where all this had reportedly started. Was he all right? She hated to cry in front of people, especially people that she only knew in passing, so she swallowed her grief and her tears for later.

The two she had picked up from the Tesoro station were Tony and Kim, cashiers that she saw on most mornings when she stopped in for her morning “gas station coffee.” There was just something about coffee gotten from a gas station that she craved. She had opined in the past that gas station coffee makers were secretly lacing their brew with heroin or at least some kind of hyper-caffeine that she just couldn’t resist.

Both Tony and Kim learned to anticipate her arrival when it was her turn to open the big retail store with which their small station shared a parking lot, and they timed the coffee brewing around her schedule. At least, that was how it appeared to her and she appreciated that.

That was, however, the extent to which she knew them. She didn’t even know their last names and there she was on the verge of tears in front of them. She fought them back for control. And then she felt the hand fall softly on her shoulder. It was Tony, sitting in the back seat and watching her in the rearview mirror.

She felt ridiculous and weak. “I’m okay,” spilled effortlessly from her lips.

“I know you are. I just wanted you to know that we’re here too.”

Meghan, not known for her shy questioning, looked over at Kim and said frankly, “‘We’re’ here? Are you guys a couple or what?”

Kim laughed.

“What? Seems like a fair question.”

“It is. It is. It’s just that we get it all the time.”

“So...what’s the deal?”

Tony answered for them. “I’m gay.”

“Oh. I guess that would be a ‘no’ then.”

Kim smiled and corrected them both, “Tony is the best boyfriend that I’ve never slept with.”

Tony, speaking more effeminately than Meghan thought possible for a man of his frame, gasped, “Oh stop,” and then laughed. The two women quickly joined him, their laughter drowning out the monotonous drone of a voice on the radio. The next sputter from the engine caught all their attention and stifled the laughs as quickly as they began.

Tony touched her shoulder again and said in his more usual bass voice, “It’s going to be okay. We’re gonna make it.”

Chuckling uncomfortably, Meghan countered, “Make it where?”

“Wherever we stop is where we’re supposed to be. You can trust in that.”

Meghan wasn’t sure what he meant, but realized that it didn’t even matter. She was just glad that her two companions were with her. The third and then the fourth sputters caused her heart to skip, but she felt a little better. She pressed the button on the side of the two-way radio and said to Neil on the other end, “I think we’ve got a problem.”

Dr. Caldwell, still wearing his dirt and blood stained lab coat, leaned toward the open side door of the helicopter. Conscious of their low fuel predicament, the pilot chose to keep their altitude conservative so that when they did have to land or possibly crash, they wouldn’t be that far from the ground.

The day was rising leisurely, autumnal laziness winning out over fading summer enthusiasm. Under different circumstances, this would have been a great day; clear, crisp, calm. The doctor thought back to past mornings; memories flashed in his mind, like drinking coffee on his family’s backyard deck; enjoying the peace before his wife and children arose from bed, absorbing those first moments of day and savoring them for himself. It was different today. Any sense of tranquility or even contentment melted away with a simple glimpse below them. The memories were crowded out of his thoughts by the concern that he harbored for his family. Luckily, his son and daughter were both out of state attending college, but his wife was still at their home on Lower Hillside. He knew that, for the time being at least, he had to focus on the immediate needs of himself and those around him.

By the time they were finally lifted off of the roof of the hospital tower, the bedlam that had started in an examination room near the Emergency Ward was spreading in both directions on the north and southbound Seward Highway. But like mercury, that sleek quicksilver seeking in every direction at once, the crisis was spreading and deepening and growing. There seemed to be no stopping it. The roar of the turbine engine and spinning rotor blades overhead thankfully muted the carnage.

Parking lots, sidewalks, streets, and stores, everything... there was only death and dying. The real tragedy was that nearly every person who died brought another living person into the fold of walking death. They passed over a police roadblock of perhaps six squad cars just as it was being overwhelmed. There was shooting and running and dying, but still the slaughter continued to spread unabated. Further south on Lake Otis, another larger roadblock was taking shape. There were more than a dozen cars and scores of officers, most armed with shotguns, settling themselves into position. He wished he could yell down to them that there was no stopping this. The best they could all hope for was to get out of the way and hope that the storm would pass.