Chapter Seven: Pale Horse

Online Blog of Jen Larice
www.deadjournal.com

Thursday, January 29th, 2004

Los Angeles is no more. It looks like its still standing. The buildings remain, towering up into the night sky, the smog is ever-present, but the truth lies in the people, in the sounds of the once-bustling city. Now, there is silence.

People flee to the world outside of the city limits, or they barricade themselves into their offices, their homes: afraid to venture out, afraid to make noise, afraid to draw attention - to themselves, their hiding places, their homes and safe havens – which are not very safe anymore.

The smells are overpowering. Gone is the exhaust, the nitty gritty and hustle of a city on the move. Now it is death, decay, over-powering stench and filth. Bodies decay and bodies walk around. Death surrounds us all.

The silence, yet not silence.

No cars, no planes, no trains, no commuters, no cell phones, no money being exchanged. Only the low moan of the dead floating through the air, the hunger, their desire for flesh.

Other moans and silent whispers - crimes of passion and crimes of terror. Flesh on flesh releases me, affirms life as the screams start up outside.

A whisper of solace hangs in the air, rescue – if we just hold on. But who would dare? California is soon to fall…

I see no man on a pale horse, yet Death rides for us all.

Tuesday, January 27th, 2004 (Part Four)

Christie closed her eyes and rubbed her aching temples. One would have thought that the concept of flesh-eating zombies wouldn’t be that hard to understand. After all, the Watcher’s Academy had taught them how to kill vampires, how to cast spells, and how to repel various demons. General Buffy herself had died twice, last time being yanked back after spending months in heaven. Hell Gods, demons—

‘Lions and tigers and zombies, oh my!’ ‘

Why were zombies such a far stretch of the imagination? Why were these Council idiots still arguing that if the riots spreading throughout the United Kingdom were indeed zombies and not a mystical infection, then it had to be some form of spell or ritual? Their solution or finding the spell caster without bothering to mount a counter-attack on the zombies was ridiculous!

She was completely exasperated with the Watchers Council. Did the Academy breed obstinance along with the desire to wear tweed? It seemed like Andrew and the other Slayers were the only ones to actually get it. One of the first things she did when she was called as a Slayer was to compile a list of all the recorded zombie attacks in Council history. None of those reports had even remotely resembled the complete works of George Romero, or any of the lesser directors who had attempted to create a horror masterpiece. Her attempts to engage in an intelligent debate during her time at the newly found Slayer Academy were laughable as well. If it wasn’t for the fact that they were running for their lives she would stop to gloat. She knew having a zombie escape plan would come in handy!

It was obvious to anyone who studied the materials available that this was an actual zombie invasion. The dead – well the infected, at least – were killing and turning their victims into zombies. A thorough analysis was definitely needed! ‘Cause seriously – being a zombie? Not my idea of a good time’

Her thoughts drifted back to her recent conversation with Andrew and Vi. Both were fellow zombie enthusiasts, and could hold an actual intellectual debate on the subject. She was thankful that Andrew seemed to be in charge at the moment, and not one of those watchers whose entire game plan consisted of flying back to London search for a non-existent spell caster.

Of course Andrew being in charge seemed to be the result of his being the only one whose solution wasn’t to throw more Slayers at the problem or hide until it went away. There wasn’t a Slayer on the plane who wasn’t backing him at the moment. With the pain and loss of Giles fresh on their minds, any plan that involved hiding and refusing to tell the world, or ordering Slayers to attack the ‘crazed’ wasn’t going over well. They wanted to save lives. Now it was up to them to figure out how.

A shrill scream caught Christie’s attention and she looked up to see three zombies slowly surrounding a young blonde.

Andrew, a handful of watchers, and the Slayers were watching as the zombies began to advance on the young girl, her body trembling in fright. Everyone seemed memorized as the flesh-eating creatures grabbed her and leaned in for a killing bite. The Slayers leaned forward in anticipation and then jumped in unison when Andrew’s voice called out, “Okay, pause it there!”

Nancy stumbled for the remote. “Why doesn’t she run away? I mean, seriously, those zombies are slow! In fact - the heck with running, why doesn’t she walk away? I could speed walk faster then those zombies are moving, and that was before I became a Slayer!”

Andrew nodded and animated conversation broke out, shortly replaced by the film once more playing in the background.

Patiently waiting her turn at lecturing, Christie faded back out, the sounds of people screaming and zombies moaning lulling her to sleep

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

The demon smiled as he surveyed his new lair. He had thought about being terribly cliché and holeing up in a mall or perhaps a large general store, but then he would have to defend himself not only against the zombies but narrow-minded humans as well. He wasn’t sure if zombies would attack demons or not, but better safe then sorry. Besides, choosing a high school for his lair and slowly doing food and weapons raids would keep his mind off of the looming apocalypse – and those friends he had lost in the last one.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Christie whipped out her notebook and began the overview.

“Sorry I didn’t have time to prepare a slide show – or heck, grab a poster board – but the whole escaping from zombies put a damper on my presentation skills!”

She took a moment to brush a strand of her purplish hair out of her face and began a rundown of assignments. “I assigned each Slayer a team to view the films and make notes. Sarah’s team watched Return of the Living Dead and the two sequels. Nancy’s team watched 28 Days Later and Dawn of the Dead – both the original and the bootlegged version we smuggled out of China.”

She made a notation and continued, “My team watched The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living and Became Mixed-Up Zombies. Why on Earth do we have that useless film? Since I actually kept that on fast-forward along with Night of the Comet, House, and My Boyfriend’s Back, we managed to survive the torture process. After two hours of fast-forwarded crap, we finally got to study Night of the Living Dead, the original and the remake of course.”

Pausing to glare at Andrew she started again, “Seriously Andrew, do you hate me? Being assigned those first three was completely unfair! And of course you assigned your team the other two bootlegged flicks. I mean Shaun of the Dead – which I so wanted – and Resident Evil One and Two.”

Andrew smiled and started to explain the wonders of Council connections and bootlegged films when he was cut off by a still glaring Christie.

“Finally, Antoinette and Line’s team watched Day of the Dead, Pet Cemetery, and Michael Jackson’s Thriller. There are of course, a ton more movies on the subject; however, that was all we managed to get out of our dorm rooms before we had to plot our escape from the undead. Well, the dead. Or is that the dead undead?”

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Monday, January 26th, 2004

Paris was rioting. It made sense really, people fleeing the islands, taking their planes, the ferries and the tunnel under the English Channel. Bringing their infections, their wounded, the dead who they thought were simply sick. She had to get out of here; she had to leave, to go home.

Her watcher was dead, fallen in battle as he commanded her to combat the demons who looked like mortals.

She thought about swimming, crossing the channel in the safety of the water, seeking out the Council in their London headquarters. She couldn’t get there any other way. England’s borders seemed to be closed.

She made it as far as Calais when she noticed something disturbing in the dark waters off Cap de Blanc. Many people were swimming from Dover. The desperate swimmers were being pulled down one by one, emerging in slow motion, with the occasional scream ripped from their lips as they were dragged under again.

The truly disturbing part however were when those pour souls emerged again – dead with chunks of flesh floating next to them, faces ripped apart, and then slowly changing. Changing from what they had been to what they would become.

She had to get home. Away from this cursed Continent, home to safety, where demons were but a legend. She wrapped up her wounded arm, and turned around. She would find another way.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Tuesday, January 27th, 2004

Vi sat cross-legged in the airplane seat and tried to get more comfortable. The conversation she was following was chaotic, interesting, and fun if one ignored the fact that it was now their reality.

Luckily someone had found Christie a tablet and easel to work with. ‘She’s as bad as Andrew!’

Christie began by reviewing the questions they had assembled during their earlier research session.

“As we all know, there are some basic zombie patterns that we need to determine before any reasonable plan of attack can be determined. First; are these zombies the slow-moving variety, or are they fast-moving type? The evidence is very convoluted at this point. Now, at Headquarters, we identified several of the affected as clearly in the zombie phase. Their blood was coagulated they had random body parts missing; they moved slowly and didn’t react to pain - all the normal yet freaky zombie stuff. On the other hand, Giles was taken down by something which moved fast.”

Christie’s voice hitched and tears gathered in her eyes. Taking a moment to compose herself she continued in a subdued tone; “Obviously, more observation is needed at this point. We need to find out if we have two types of zombies, or possibly a zombie and some other sort of medical experiment ala Resident Evil. Please try to catalogue as much about the zombies when fighting, but do not put yourself in a position to be bitten!”

“Which puts us onto our second point - that of transmission of…zombieness. The scientists argue that the most logical point of transmission would be blood-borne transmission. We have seen this concept with 28 Days and it does make sense. But until the scientists are able to confirm somehow, don’t rule anything out.”

Christie took a breath and beamed a smile at one of Watchers Academy students who they had rescued before fleeing from London. At least their was one Watcher, well a student who was six months shy of being a full-fledged Watcher, but one person on the Council team who actually had a brain and was using it.

“We had some excellent, if unusual, questions from Kevin concerning transmission of the virus, but it’s things like that which we need to consider. If the agent causing the zombieness is some form of mystical virus, then it might be possible to catch it in other ways, such as from people before they turn.”

“Basically, stay away from the mouth of anyone who might be infected, or any zombie in general. I highly doubt that you can catch it from saliva, but I would hate to lose people due to assumptions. Of course, transmission through saliva and bodily fluids does bring up the ookyness factor. Sarah was right on that. If a zombie licks you, can you become infected? If you kiss an infected person before they are turned into a zombie, do you turn as well? We aren’t going to reiterate the transmission through other bodily fluids either.” Several quiet snickers followed this, and Christie glared at the giggling Slayers- and quite a few of the students from the Watchers Academy, as well. “Zombie STD’s are not something I want to have to lecture on, people!”

Satisfied that she’d made her point, she continued, “Our third point is can these zombies be killed? We’ve seen several clear examples in the films that zombies are only vulnerable to severing the brain cortex – cutting off their head or something like that. So, until we know otherwise, shoot for the head. If it turns out that these are the kind that you can’t kill, then life on this planet is doomed anyway. As obviously shown in the Return of the Living Dead series, if they cannot be killed, then even nuclear bombs will just hasten the spread of the zombie plague. Of course that film also showed intelligent zombies capable of speech and rational thinking. I haven’t seen anything rational or talkative about those we’ve seen so far, so we’re probably safe.”
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

The lab experiments were going fairly well. The technicians had caught the zombie on an incoming plane from Lima. The sporadic route the girl had taken had caught their attention. Maria Gianecchini had been in northern France for undisclosed reasons, and travelled from France to Amsterdam, and then bought a ticket into Peru via Amsterdam – Chicago - Miami before finally purchasing tickets for an overnight flight to Rio.

The bizarre route, especially coming from the areas which were showing increasing zombie activity and the strange details of the flight – a lone woman with no luggage gave one the impression she was fleeing. She was a Brazilian citizen, so technically she could have just been trying to come home, but there were much more direct routes she could have taken.

They almost overlooked her at first. The studies and experiments they had conducted on other zombies that they removed from incoming flights had shown that the average person, given good health, would die from a zombie bite within 24 hours of becoming infected. Those who actually were infected and then killed would rise instantaneously as a zombie. However, those who were already dead– for example; a soldier killed in the line of duty by a bullet- could not be reanimated by being bitten.

The technician smiled. ‘This is truly fascinating’

Yet this young girl, Subject Z-819, had been bitten three days prior to her containment in the Rio Cell – Initiative IV. She was quite hostile when they detained her – not in a violent, ‘I am going to eat your brains’ manner’, but more of a yelling, kicking, and screaming at the top of her lungs manner. Her threats had been quite amusing.

He had been wondering if the bite caused some type of mutation in her. She was much stronger then any of the infected – both before and after they had become zombies. Perhaps she had some immunity in her blood that would account for these differences. If the soldiers hadn’t found the vicious bite mark on her arm, they might have even believed it was a misunderstanding on their part and let her go.

But they did find the bite. There were signs of infection around her eyes- a general sick and veiny look associated with someone who is coming down with influenza- and then on the fourth day, she turned.

Another thing that was an anomaly – she wasn’t like the other zombies. She was as fast as she was deadly. Her intelligence level seemed to be the same – very primal. Although she seemed to recognize more of her surroundings and seemed to be able to understand basic concepts, it was her strength and speed that was truly frightening.

He frowned as the intercom crackled. He had been dreading the arrival of the agents in charge of the military plan. They had been very angry when his superiors had talked to them previously. It was always the same problem with the bosses all over the world. They were always trying to interfere.

Before he could respond to the intercom request, the newly commissioned Lieutenant Colonel Riley Finn strode in.

“What the HELL do you think you’re doing by taking custody of a Slayer? Do you KNOW what they’ll do to this base if they find out you’re holding one of their girls here?”

The scientist started to protest, sputtering that the girl was dead, so it hardly mattered, when an alarm sounded.

Riley checked the monitor and saw only an empty room where the slayer had once been confined.

‘I’m definitely not going to be the one who explains this to Buffy.’

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Vi was furiously taking notes as Christie continued, “Point Fifteen is the incubation period. How long does it take an infected individual to turn into a zombie? We traced the zombie infection to a scientist in the mystical and biological research lab. He reported to the infirmary the same day he turned, so the rate of infection seems to be under 36 hours. We don’t know more then that at the moment because- well, most of the people working on the infected became zombies themselves.”

“I think it’s safe to say that the average zombiefcation process is about a day, give or take. I also believe the Slayers are immune, because several got bit and didn’t turn right away, but until we have the details confirmed for sure, please take no chances.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Riley and Graham took point as the rest of their squad, including Sam, flanked in formation. He had warned the government about opening multiple branches of the Initiative throughout the world. Even if they were no longer implanting demons, or creating new ones, their so-called research was going to be the cause of another disaster because they truly didn’t understand the supernatural. They were like little kids in a candy store.

He’d warned them experimentation was dangerous. He’d told them about Adam, about Maggie, and how the civilians were the ones to save the day. His only reward was being promoted and made official liaison with the new Council. Then they had to go and kidnap a Slayer…

And now she had died while in their custody.

‘This is not a good day.’

Besides the fact that the Slayer zombie had escaped, reports were coming back that several of the men that had apprehended her at the airport had already turned. How they’d managed to conceal the fact that they had been infected, they may never know, but this was a nightmare.

Riley continued to ponder how he was going to report this to his supervisors when a blur of hair and teeth flew by.

‘Oh God, oh God, oh God…!’

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Christie continued, “Point twenty-three, can vampires turn into zombies? This concern was raised, again, by Kevin. This is something that has never been discussed in any of the films or Council reports; however, the question is valid.”

“Vampires are- for all intents and purposes- the same as humans, albeit dead humans. There have a basic human physiology and identical brain patterns as far as we can tell. They are simply undead and require blood to sustain themselves.”

“Therefore the question remains unanswered - can they be zombiefied? If one can become a vampire zombie, would they dust in sunlight, or only through decapitation? Or does the very fact that they’re already dead prevent them from turning into an even more deadly creature?”

“Finally, do we even have a way to test this theory or do we just randomly stalk vampires to see if any of them are zombies?”

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Riley was covered in blood and tears streaked down his face. He couldn’t believe it. That creature…that horrible creature had killed his Sam. He sobbed and held her body, rocking it back and forth. As Graham started to pull him away he fought his friend. His beautiful wife. Her name escaped him like a prayer, “Sam.”

She opened her eyes and lunged.

A single shot rang out.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

“Point twenty-seven, how does a zombie determine who will be its food source? Is it by the way they act, such as in Shaun of the Dead? Is there some type of human ‘smell’ like a vampire would be able to pick up, or it is something else? These zombies only seem to be attacking the non-infected humans, but would they attack vampires – or animals?”

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Graham dragged a barely coherent Riley out of the Initiative compound.

“We have to go. The base is overrun and we have our orders. This research must get to Willow. She’s here in Rio and the Council may be our only hope. Then we have to shut down the airports and—”

Riley tuned out Graham’s voice. He had served his God and his country, and this was his reward? Losing the only thing which had truly mattered to him- his world, his life, Sam. Now the only thing left for him was death.

‘To Hell with God and Country’

He lifted his revolver …

TBC…