Dead Hunger III: The Chatsworth Chronicles (5 page)

Jerry charged again, once more screaming “Fucking starving!”  His voice was a stiff growl, distorted as though his vocal cords were partially paralyzed.  His arms flailed as he
got
to within grabbing distance of
Sergeant
Petrie again.

This time Petrie didn’t hesitate. 
His gun in his hand, h
e screamed, “Jerry!” and shot him in t
he chest almost simultaneously.

The explosion rocked my senses.  I smelled the gunpowder immediately, and blood and tissue ejected from Jerry’s back.  Petrie’s fellow officer
flew back against the desk and I scrambled out of the way just before his back
slammed into the counter top.

He looked dazed, but he should have looked nothing more than dead.

And of course, I know now that he was, because he pulled himself from against that counter and looked down at me.

Petrie saw immediately that I was the new target.  He moved forward fast, put the gun to Jerry’s head and fired a single shot into
his
brain.

I was lying on my stomach, my face in my hands, flat on the floor.

“Get up,
pal.
 
We’re going somewhere safe
if
I can find
a place
.
  Let’s go!
”
  He reached down and pulled the dead cop’s gun from its holster.

I strained to get up on my shaky legs.  “But we’re in a damned police station!  What’s happening here, officer?”

“I don’t know,” Petrie said.  “
But try to keep up with me,” 

He ran down the hall and I followed. 

“
It came on fast
,” he huffed.
 
“
Some complaints of migraines, several officers called in today.  I thought it was the blue flu, but there wasn’t any dispute that I knew of.  Now this. 
I’m saving my breath for now.  Listen to that shit.”

Screams echoed from the hallways on both sides
as we ran
.

He stopped suddenly and turned. 
“Can you handle a weapon?” he asked,
a calm urgency in his eyes.

“Yes.  Absolutely.”

Petrie
handed me
Officer Jerry’s
gun.
  I wiped the blood from the butt and checked it.  Fully loaded
stainless steel .45 automatic
.  I wondered why Jerry didn’t just shoot Petrie if he wanted to subdue him so badly, but all
of my
questions would eventually be answered
, one way or the other
.

And the answers were the worst imaginable.

“This way.  I’m going to run
again, and I ain’t waiting
, so you’d better keep up!”

We ran.  We ran through the hallway until we came across another officer running toward us.  He also had his gun drawn.

“You okay,
S
ergeant?”
asked the
officer, who’s name badge said
his last name was
Vaughan
.

“I am, but you won’t be if you don’t get somewhere out of sight.  I can’t explain what’s happening, and I don’t have the time to try.”

“Who’s the guy?”

“CDC scientist.  We’re going.  Follow if you want.”

He did.  We made a right down the hall and ran into what were clearly more of the crazies.  Neither I
,
nor Sergeant Petrie hesitated.  I put a bullet in one, and he quickly pierced the frontal lobes of the others.

“Jesus!” he shouted, his voice faltering. “I knew them both!”

“I think you used to know them, officer.”

We looked behind us, but
Vaughan
was no longer there.  We caught sight of his shoe as he rounded the corner.  He was likely heading for the front door to get the hell out of the building.

I didn’t
want
to know his fate
, but eventually I would; and it was nothing like I would have predicted at that moment
. 

A man was on the floor ahead
of us
in front of an office door, and he was tearing at the insides of a dead man sprawled out on his back.
  He was so engrossed in his task that he did not look up for several seconds, as we stood there stunned, watching the horrific scene of one human consuming another like
a
wild
animal
in the jungle.

I threw up onto the smooth linoleum floor as Petrie ran forward and shot the creature.

“My God,” I said weakly.

“Step over them and come inside here,” he said.  “It’s my office.”

We both leapt over the bodies and ran inside.  He closed the door and locked it.

We looked at one another.

“I got a fucking headache,” he said.

“Bad?”

“The worst,” he said.  “I don’t know what’s going on, but I wish I’d have been one of the cops who called in today.
”

He fell back into his chair and closed his eyes.

I didn’t.  I was beginning to put two and two together, but I wasn’t willing to articulate anything yet.  A lightning fast mental illness that affected the brain was changing these people.

And it was my guess it started with a headache.

A knock came at the door.

“Sergeant!  It’s me, Jackson Vaughan!  Open up!”

“Get that, would you?  Hurry, please,” he said.

“Are you sure?”

He nodded tiredly.  “Yes, now, open the door.”

I did, and
Vaughan
rushed in, his breath coming hard.  He was bleeding from his shoulder.

“Fucker bit me,” he said.  “
He d
rew blood!”

Petrie had his head
down on the desk, breathing hard.

“You okay,
S
ergeant?”

“No,” came his reply.  “I’m tired, I’m hungry, and my head feels like it’s going to explode.  Just let’s be quiet for a few minutes.”

“We need to call for help!” shouted
Vaughan
.  “Sergeant, we –”

“Shut up!” Petrie shouted.  “Did you see out there?  Who are we going to call that can get through that?”

“Fucking SWAT comes to
mind!  The
military?  What’s wrong with you?”

Petrie pulled his gun out and shot him in the chest.
  His fellow officer flew backward and slammed into the wall, then dropped like a stone, his eyes wide, staring at Petrie with dying eyes.

Petrie shot him again.  Through the heart.

I know I’d gone white.  My mouth was dry.  I was afraid to breathe, or I’d be shot, too.  I stared at the floor.

And then he looked at me.  “
That fuckin’ guy wouldn’t have made it, and I never liked him much anyway. 
How do you feel,
Doc?
”

I was
still
afraid to answer.  I was
more
afraid not to.

“I feel fine, Sergeant Petrie.”

“Good.  Get yourself to a jail cell and lock yourself in.  I think it’s your only hope, because I am beginning to think that I want to tear your throat out and
. . . and for Christ’s sake, I . . .”

He looked at his gun, then back at me.

I stared at him
, clutching the grip of my gun tighter.  My hand was clammy.  The man who just said that to me had earlier saved my life, and he was about to horrify me.

Sergeant Petrie took his sidearm
,
put the barrel underneath his chin and pulled the trigger.

His
blood, tissue and brain
splattered
the wall behind him in a crimson pattern that would
’ve
give
n
Dexter himself a day’s work.

I looked at the dead officers’ bodies once more
before unlocking
the door.  Pressing my ear to it, I heard screams in the distance.

Easing it open, I checked down the hall in both directions.
 
Empty, save for the bodies piled in front of the door.

And then I went in search of the cell block. 
Despite being on the edge of conversion into whatever these things were,
I was certain Petrie was right.  It was my only chance to survive.

I ran.

At the end of the hallway, I saw signs directing me to the lockup.  I followed them, and luckily didn’t encounter any more officers, either sick or otherwise.  If they’d have been well, they surely would’ve shot me, carrying
a weapon inside
a police station,
especially when I wasn’t
in uniform.

I
f they weren’t well, then I’d have had to shoot them.  I’d never killed a man before that day, and I wasn’t liking the feeling one bit.  Not one bit at all.  I felt sick.

But not physically.  No headache.  I felt perfectly healthy.

I turned another corner and saw two
uniformed men teetering unsteadily across
the hall.
They were facing away from me. 
I saw a narrow door to my left
, which
I opened
as quietly as I could
.  It was a janitorial
supply
closet
no more than
three feet square
.  I
scrambled
inside and eased the door closed.  Darkness.  Muffled voices and screams outside now.

I stayed there for a long, long time.  Hours.  Soon it became like a cocoon to me.  It was my
dark cave of solace
.  I didn’t ever want to leave and encounter more of what lay outside that small room that smelled of bleach and
urinal
cakes
.

I
felt around and to my pleasure, my hand fell upon
a small flashlight
.  I switched it on and saw
a string mop
hanging on the inside of the door
.  I pulled several strings from it and knotted them together, then secured the doorknob to the inside rack of
wire
shelves, tripling the thickness until I felt that no amount of pulling would allow
the door to be pulled
open.

I eventually fell asleep, my body drained of strength, adrenaline, and everything else.

According to my watch, when I finally awoke, it was just past ten in the morning – the next day.

And I thought the
Kennedy
Space
Center
would tire me out. 

The sounds still echoed through the distant halls.  I was afraid to leave.

But it wasn’t like me to cower and hide, either.

I opened the door, my mouth parched, and saw a water fountain thirty feet away.

I went for it
. 
I needed it.

****

The
gun
in my hand, I ran down the hall and checked in all directions.  I could still hear quite a commotion in the distance, but it was far enough away that I felt safe taking a drink.

And I drank
a
nd
drank.  The power was fully functional, and when I felt I’d had enough, I ran back to the opposite corner of the hallway, peered around it and ran toward the cell block.

As I passed a dead officer’s body, I saw he had a swipe card of some kind on a lanyard hanging off his belt.  I bent over and took it, then continued on.  When I got to the closed steel door with a small window in it criss-crossed with steel wire, I peered through.  A row of cells on each side, all of them empty.

Where were the prisoners?  All the doors stood open.  I didn’t care. 
I pulled on the door and it didn’t open.  Holding
the swipe card, I saw a
black box mounted on the wall with a slot and a red and green light.  The red one was illuminated.

I swiped the card, heard a click and the light turned green.  I pulled the door open and quickly went inside.

The door was about to close behind me, and at the last moment I went back and put my foot in it.

I didn’t know how long the power would remain on.  If it latched, there would be no way of knowing whether I could get back out.

I went back down the hall where I’d seen a metal chair.  I grabbed it and ran back to the door, swiped the card again, and went back inside, propping the door open with the chair.

Then I went into a cell and pulled the barred door closed to the point where it almost appeared closed, but wasn’t.