Dead and Forsaken (9 page)

“
Screech!”

He
passed out from the blood loss and pain. His mother tried to save
him but got her throat ripped out. The blood flowed heavily from her
neck. Somehow she still managed to crawl across the floor and cover
her son’s body with hers trying to conceal him. The forsaken
also attacked an old man with a walker. He tried to fight them off
with it smashing the aluminum into them crushing bone but there were
too many of them. One bite quickly became ten as blood spatter
patterns soon covered his freshly pressed pants and ironed shirt.
The sound of him dying in agony filled the waiting room. Everyone
was wailing and crying out for help that wasn’t coming. The
forsaken inflicted severe physical injuries and untold suffering. A
young woman tried to hide under a table that one them was standing
on. She was terrified by everything she saw and curled up in a ball
trying to hide from him. It is impossible to say how many minutes
she laid there frozen in place as people were killed around her. She
tried to play dead but they heard her breathing. “Get away
from me. Get away!”

The
ungodly horde flipped the table over and feasted on her young body.
They left another young man in the room with his shirt ripped and
ribcage exposed. They ate the flesh off his chest and tore his left
arm off. The young woman next to him was still alive as the horde
devoured both her legs leaving strings of meat hanging from the
exposed bones. Blood spurted from the severed arteries and veins.
She remained conscious through the whole ordeal before finally dying
from blood loss. The forsaken also killed her sister by pulling her
organs out her belly and consuming them slowly. Clearly shaken by
the graphic images Hernandez let out a scream over the radio. His
voice was trembling as he tried to speak. He saw the blood bath on
the camera and wanted to save them but was powerless to intervene.
It was the worst thing he ever witnessed. “Hurry up and get to
the waiting room Robinson!” he begged. “They're killing
everyone!” I did not know what was going on but I heard the
terror in his voice. I hurried down the hall to see what was going
on. “Aaahhhiiieee!”

I
rushed faster when I heard the screaming. I went to the window at
the registration desk. By the time I got there multiple people were
down and bleeding. I stood there watching with the triage nurses and
registration girls. One of the hungry forsaken picked a young boy
up by his head. He had become an animal. All of his memory from his
past life was lost to the new hunger he felt inside. The eviscerated
monstrosity’s first bite landed on the boy’s neck.

“
MUNCH!”

The
bite cut open his carotid artery causing massive blood loss. The
bastard also bit off his nose and ears then he tossed his limp body
against the bullet proof registration window.

“
SLAM!”

The high intensity attack left his
corpse disfigured. The forsaken killer starred at us through the
glass as the boys blood ran down his chin and stained his pizza shop
work shirt. Again and again he attacked the window pounding his
boney dead fist into the thick glass.

“
BAM!
BAM! BAM!”

I
had a responsibility to protect everyone but it was too late. I
moved all the rest of the employees and patients away from the
window. They would suffer lifelong emotional trauma from what the
saw if they lived through tonight. There was no hope for those poor
souls in the waiting room. Every single human being in the waiting
room was soon dead. The only thing left besides traces of blood were
shreds of clothes, shoes, and a few cell phones. They littered the
floor along with unconsumed body parts. The large group of forsaken
tried to get through the bulletproof glass while their friends fed.
The chaotic scene and carnage lasted nineteen minutes. Suddenly
everything was calm. The forsaken had their fill and left as slowly
as they came. A jumbled patch work of bloody footprints marked their
exit. Unfortunately for us the killing would continue. One of the
house keepers had neglectfully propped open the steel security doors
leading to the main hospital. Most of the blood thirsty pack was
able to push forward into the rest of the building. Hernandez said
he could see the forsaken assaulting patients and hospital personnel
all across the first floor. The emerging creatures injured and
wounded dozens. If we didn’t get help A.S.A.P. the death toll
was going to rise.

We were still trying to
process what just happened. This was the top trauma center in
Phoenix and the ER staff was highly trained. They work under bad
conditions all the time. They dealt with disasters before but this
outbreak was different. They immediately started to identify the
most seriously injured patients. This is what the ER staff did best.
At least fifty or more people were still in the ER. They were
scared, jumpy and some were in shock. Several people mumbled to
themselves in between their tears. They were all exhausted and
running on adrenaline. Dr. Sanchez jumped right in and tried to
comfort everyone. One young girl had lost her sister. Her screams
caught all of our attention.

“
No! No! No!” she
yelled hysterically. ”That is not her!”
Going through something like will change you. No amount of
reassuring from Dr. Sanchez could bring her sister back. She was a
child and could not comprehend what just happened.

“
They killed my sister!”
she screamed while trying to call 911 on her cell phone. ”They
killed my best friend in the world.”

Almost
every cell phone network was busy to calls but some text messages
got through. Even the adults could feel her pain. Most of them were
inconsolable and will have long lasting emotional scars. Many of
them criticized the staff and were verbally abusive. Some of them
even threatened to sue the hospital for lack of adequate security.
They had nothing left to live for but somehow showed incredible
resilience.

“
What the hell is going?”
a man asked.” Why are they doing this?”

“
This is it!”
screeched a young woman. “This is the end!”
When
you work in the ER you see the evil that men do all the time. Our
staff members saw death and destruction on a daily basis but this
attack was more barbaric and disturbing. All around the ER I saw
dedicated doctors and nurses struggling to save lives. They had to
deal with the patients and the horrible death that waited just
outside. I could tell the staff was under a lot of psychological
pressure. Some of them struggled to keep it together. They were
running around like chickens with their heads cut off. They had to
take care of their patients and their colleagues.

Every
couple of minutes someone would start crying or have a panic attack
before pulling it back together. One nurse temporarily developed
amnesia and forgot how to talk. She spent so much time taking care
of everyone else that she had no time to deal with their own fear
and anxiety. After all the carnage witnessed tonight everyone’s
foundation was rocked a little. Anne a girl from registration rocked
back and forth in disbelief

“
Oh my God!” she
pleaded. “God please help us!”
Her eyes were
puffy and tears streamed down her face.

She
had just watched the janitor’s lifeless body dragged off
leaving a trail of his blood behind it.

“
This isn’t right!”
she yelled. “I knew him for God sake!”
Some of the people
in the ER did not stay. They were so scared that they did not think
about it twice. They just reacted. The only thing that mattered to
everyone was they did not feel safe in the hospital anymore. They
fled out the ER’s ambulance doors running into the darkness
and uncertain terror. I guess they were foolish enough to think they
could escape the dead ghouls lurking around the neighborhood. The
viciousness and depravity of the attack sent shock waves through the
emergency department.

Dr.
Black could see doubt creeping in and moral breaking down. He got up
and spoke words to us that put everything in perspective.

“
I am a workaholic who
works sixty to eighty hours a week. I work hard to provide for my
family. We live in a spacious house in Scottsdale. My kids attended
private schools all their life. I spent my money buying them
anything they wanted. I’m a good provider but I just was not
around for birthdays, ball games, or anniversaries. My wife always
wanted us to take a dance class together but I was always busy. One
time I showed up an hour late to my daughter’s recital. I even
missed my oldest son’s graduation party! I just always thought
I would have time later to spend with my family but now I may never
see them again. Every day we spend with our loved ones is a gift.”
he explained. “We should not spend all our time worrying about
material things and money. Without anyone to spend our lives with
material things are worthless! Right now the only thing I want is to
kiss my wife and hug my kids!”

“
I’m sorry sir that may
never happen!” said Dr. Okonkwo. “Not as long as those
things are out there!”

“
They appear to be human but
no human would do the things that I saw them do!” he
responded. “We have to lock down this ER!”

Dr.
Black quickly took charge. He ordered Dr. Sanchez and Dr. Okonkwo to
tell the remaining staff to look for anyone with a bite wound. We
needed to quarantine all the bite victims and separate them from the
other survivors. We decided to put all of them in the secure holding
section of the ER used for psychiatric patients. It already had beds
in the room and there was only one way in or out. No one wanted to
be locked up but they were not stupid enough to do something to get
shot. I locked the steel door from the outside with two dead bolts.
Before I left I looked through the twelve inch by twelve inch
Plexiglas window at all the people inside. All of them were scared
and had sad looks on their faces. They had been someone’s
family member. I felt bad just leaving them there to turn into
monsters. I wish there was a cure for this thing but I would have
felt better just shooting all of them. Under normal circumstances
doctors don’t kill patients just because they are sick and
contagious. Until Dr. Black had another treatment plan they would
have to stay locked up for now. This was a temporary fix to a
serious problem. This epidemic was a mass casualty event but we had
no way to save people or warn the outside world. The survivors were
desperate and disorientated. Normally the ER attending physician
would contact the local police and fire department but we couldn't
get through. Randy the maintenance man let us know that if we needed
it there was a backup generator. The hospital normally stored five
days of fuel but the fuel for the generators was not cheap. He said
that the board told him not to purchase fuel this month. They wanted
to see if the price went down. He did not know how much fuel we had
in the tank. The charge nurse told us that there were only three
days of painkillers and medications left in the ER. Dr. Black said
that from the info he got from the charts of the men from #6 and #10
that we had about two hours before the other victims died and tried
to eat us. He knew that after a bite exposure the patient would
develop an upset stomach. The victim would become queasy and have a
brain boiling body temperature of 106 degrees or more. The
temperature caused respiratory failure and death. Each victim would
become a monster capable of murder. Every hour their numbers were
growing. Dr. Okonkwo organized a group of nurses and techs to move
the dead bodies from the hall into a large supply closet. That
included the large man and Mark Cordova.

The
bodies were stacked up inside. I locked it when they were finished.
The next step was to find a way to keep those things out of the ER.
The one hundred pound capacity magnets connected to the ambulance
doors could keep them locked. That was good but most of the door was
made out of glass. We needed to set up a barricade in order to
reinforce the glass and block the doors off. He got a couple of men
together and we moved the refrigerators from the staff office and
paramedic break room out into the hall. We pressed all four of them
against the steel door frame. Then we stacked the empty beds from
the hall behind them. It would keep those things out for now and
might buy us some time. I went around to all the other doors with
Randy the maintenance man. We secured all of them by using the
patient restraints like chains on the handles. We also created
barricades made out of unused medical equipment. Dr. Black asked
Maria and Dr. Okonkwo to go room to room with him to talk to the
patients and staff. Many of them had just lost friends and family
members. There was no way to forget the image of a live human being
eaten alive and consumed. We were in a real life nightmare. You
could close your eyes or try to wake up but you could not get away
from it. The lives lost tonight were irreplaceable. They had to
tell a teenage boy that his sister and grandparents were dead. They
never made it out of the waiting room. He started cursing and fell
to his knees overwhelmed with grief. Some of the other patients
asked Pastor Harrell to pray with them. Other patients withdrew all
together and refused to talk. I looked into all their faces and did
not see any hope. Who could blame them? That’s when I saw the
flash of red, blue and yellow lights. Through a small opening in the
barricade we could see an ambulance coming up the road. The sirens
were blaring and the emergency lights illuminated the darkness.

The
display of lights got everyone’s attention. Those things saw
them too and moved closer. As the ambulance slowed down the driver
did not notice the growing crowd. He saw the figures walking around
in the darkness but people were always at the hospital. Just like
all the rest of the first responders his crew was overwhelmed with
calls to pick up the sick and injured. He parked in the ambulance
bay next to the other ambulances. The crew had transported patients
to this hospital a thousand times. This time the paramedics were
here to drop off an injured female patient. The driver grabbed the
woman’s paper work and headed for the double glass doors. She
had been in a car crash. The woman was fleeing the scene of some
sort of domestic disturbance. Her SUV struck a divider in the middle
of the road and flipped on its side. She was cut and bruised when
the airbag inflated. They found her slumped over the wheel choking
on her own blood.

The
male passenger next to her impacted the windshield and was thrown
from the truck. He flew through the air and skidded across the
asphalt coming to a hard stop against the curb. Layers of skin were
peeled off causing road rash. His head was sliced open because his
body was traveling so fast. He left a six foot long by foot wide
smear. The tough unforgiving asphalt had ground him to a bloody
stump. A few teeth were left sticking out his deformed and mangled
jaw. The driver's partner and a trainee took the patient out the
back of the rig. They hung her IV on a pole and strapped her to the
gurney. While walking to the door the driver saw a man standing with
his back to him. The man was pounding on the sliding glass doors.
The driver walked towards him and the sound of his footsteps caused
the man to turn around. Any change in sound or smell told them that
food was nearby. The creatures could also differentiate between the
aroma of the dead and the living. They ended up only a few feet
apart. For the first time the driver could see the blood on his
shirt and the wounds on his neck. The man looked at him with a crazy
look on his face. His skin was bruised and discolored.

“
GROOOWWWL!”

The driver backed up because he
was startled. His partner and the trainee had their backs to him.
They did not see what happened. He backed right into a woman that
walked up behind him. He turned to face her and their eyes met. Her
eyes looked glazed over with a white film and her nose was missing.
Blood soaked her yellow belly shirt and white tights.
He yelled “What
the hell!”
“CHOMP!”

Suddenly he felt excruciating pain
in his face as he yelled in pain.

“
Yowl!”

The woman was wildly swinging her
arms scratching and biting him. His friends turned around when he
screamed just in time to see the silhouettes of the woman and the
man attacking him. They ripped the drivers face open. He pushed the
woman away from him as blood gushed from the puncture wound under
his right eye. The man outside the doors grabbed him by the neck and
bit his ear off.

Together
they both pulled the driver to the ground. His partner and the
trainee rushed to help him. The driver lost all his fingers and
ended up with a bloody gnawed up stump. His screams signaled the
dinner bell for the rest of the undead forsaken roaming the parking
lot. They slowly walked out of the darkness and moved in closer.
His partner heard their moaning and the trainee saw their teeth.

“
GROOOWWWL!
GROOOWWWL! GROOOWWWL!”

“
Look there are more of
them!” screamed the partner.

Eight
hungry forsaken creatures surrounded them in seconds.

“
Go ahead and run!”
yelled the partner. “I’ll be right behind you!”

The
partner shoved two of them to the ground but another one bit him on
the arm. The scared trainee turned to run but he tripped and knocked
himself and the driver down. The trainee was able to get off the
ground but a mob of hands pulled the driver apart. Their bony dead
fingers and decaying hands raked across his skin and punctured his
flesh. They bit both of his legs and his back. Hands with knife like
fingers ripped the partners buttocks open. They pulled his colon out
his body. Thankfully the pain was only temporary. He had his spine
separated seconds and lost all feeling and sensation. The beasts ate
him alive while He laid there with his eyes open bleeding to death.
The trainee jumped up on the hood of the ambulance and climbed up on
top of the rig. He tried to lie down and be quiet.