The following is an excerpt from LAX, a short story in my soon to be released novel UNDEAD LA 1. It's about an airline pilot who wakes up on the worst day of his life...the day after the zombie apocalypse hits Los Angeles.
Edgar never bothered to
check out. It was a habit he'd gotten into when he was in college
that had stuck with him. When he was ready to go, he simply walked
out and shut the door behind him. Over the years he'd learned to take
the keys with him, in case he left something. Later when the bill
came in he'd compare it to his check-in receipts. So far he'd never
had a problem with being overcharged. Usually he just breezed past
the front door in uniform with his aviator glasses on, and didn't
bother to acknowledge the employee working the front desk – if they
even spoke to him. But as he stepped out the door that morning he
decided it was time to have a quick chat with management about the
falling standards, and maybe ask for a discount on his room.
“They can do better
than this,” he said. “A lot better.”
The hallway was dark. The
power was out in the whole building. Edgar wondered if it was just
this block or all of Los Angeles. He made his way to the stairs. The
emergency lighting was on. He held the rail cautiously as he walked
down and exited the Radisson, ending up out in front of the hotel
instead of in the lobby as he'd planned. He stepped out into the
bright sun with his carryon, and the door shut behind him as his
heart leaped into his throat and his mouth went dry. All around him
were signs of total chaos. It looked like some psychotic artist had
painted the parking lot and grounds with buckets of human blood and
entrails. He looked down next to his foot and saw a woman's hand with
her engagement ring still on. It looked like it had been chewed off
at the wrist. He turned it over with the polished tip of his shoe,
and it fell in the grass near the planter. He turned it over with the
polished tip of his shoe, and it fell in the grass near the planter.
His eyes wandered from it to what looked like a human rib cage
resting in the valet parking next to a blood soaked Cadillac Escalade
the doors left wide open. Edgar slowly walked over to it until he
could make out the sound of the car door binging. The keys were still
in the ignition. The carcass next to it looked like it had been torn
apart by savage beasts with dull teeth. There were bite marks on top
of the ripped flesh as well as on some of the intestines drooling out
the bottom where the stomach and legs should be. Edgar saw that there
was hair growing out of some of the skin, and figured it didn't
belong to the woman who had lost her hand.
“What the fuck is going
on?”
He turned in wide
circles. The hotel lobby looked empty, but it too was covered with
dark, coagulated blood. There were bloody handprints smeared on the
glass windows and doors at the entrance. He turned back to the street
and saw in the distance that there were figures moving out on Century
Boulevard. Then he spotted an Asian man limping away at the far end
of the parking lot. Without thinking he jogged toward him, doing his
best to catch up with the slow moving man in the tattered business
suit.
“Hey,” he called out.
The man stopped but did not turn around or reply. “Hey, man! What's
going on out here? Are you all right?”
Edgar could see the
street more clearly now. It was filled with abandoned cars; some had
smashed into each other and were left behind, others were left
idling. In between the cars were what looked like dead people slowly
moving around. They were all ages, and from all walks of life. Men,
women, and children, all races, all dressed differently. Some were
missing body parts like arms or legs. Some had huge bloody wounds
showing through their tattered clothing. Some had blood pouring from
their eyes like tears. All of them had the gray skin associated with
long-dead corpses. Edgar thought about an article he'd read in an
in-flight magazine about a Zombie Walk in Las Vegas during a horror
convention. He thought about the images in the article, but they were
nothing like this. Those were happy, smiling faces covered in bright
red makeup and hand-torn clothing. This was something else
altogether.
The Asian businessman
turned around to face Edgar. It felt like having the wind knocked out
of him in slow motion. The whole world seemed to tilt sidewise as his
half-eaten face came into full view. Edgar fought back the sudden
urge to throw up at the gruesome sight of him. Frayed skin tissue
radiated out from where huge chunks of flesh had been ripped clean.
There were grooves in the remaining skin that made it look like it
had been peeled off or scratched away by dull instruments.
Like
human teeth, Edgar thought, or
clawing fingernails.
In some places, Edgar
could see down to the boney material he assumed was part of the man's
skull, especially near the temples. The man was grinding his jaw
absentmindedly like a drug addict. With each movement Edgar could see
deeper into the layers of exposed muscle as a dark red, mucus-like
substance leaked out over the remaining flesh. Worst of all were the
man’s eyes. There was a jaundiced haze forming over them with
evidence of blood in the right eye, partially obscuring the cornea.
The pupils themselves were dilated and empty of consciousness, like
two wide angle lens closed circuit cameras pulling everything around
them into some unspeakable void.
What
could have happened to him to leave him in this condition?
Edgar realized he could
hear the man moaning, even though he was over a hundred feet away.
There were no car horns, no traffic sounds, and worst of all, no
planes. Edgar glanced up nervously to confirm his suspicion and saw
not a single aircraft in the sky. As he looked back down, the man
with the gnarled face raised his puss-covered hands in his direction
and let out a delirious howl of hunger. The next thing Edgar knew the
man was charging at him, his limbs oddly flailing as he moved.
“What the fuck?”
It was all he could
manage before his 'fight or flight' instinct finally kicked in. He
felt his legs go from being two solid and unyielding slabs of
concrete to feeling like thin, rubbery trees as they abruptly
unlocked, threatening to pitch him to the already hot asphalt of the
parking lot. He wobbled for a millisecond as the awareness reached
him and his adrenaline kicked in, then pivoted and turned to run. His
arms moved like two unattached windmills; his heart racing now,
pumping hot fear and fresh panic into him. It felt like he'd just
slammed down ten shots of espresso all at once! Every thought ceased,
his generally incessant inner monologue going surprisingly quiet as
the reality of the danger of his situation fully set in. He seemed to
be moving at half speed, the way he did sometimes in dreams, where
everything else was moving normally and he was mired down in
molasses. He felt the muscles of his right calf seize up as he
urgently kicked away from the ground in an attempt to force start a
run, and no lack of warming up was going to stop him from escaping.
Not
today, he thought with fierce determination.
He sprinted forward a few
steps, feeling a new confidence enter into him. It didn't matter what
was really going on. There would be plenty of time to figure that all
out later. All that mattered now was that he escape in one piece. He
locked his eyes on the open door of the Escalade and decided it was
his best chance for sanctuary and a possible getaway. His feet
pounded against the ground as he turned toward the door, and he gave
it all he had. He marveled for a split second about how amazingly
resilient the human body was, how the mind, so often murky and tired
and muddled, could be cleared instantly in the face of an eminent
threat to one's survival.
It's
written in the DNA, he thought.
He heard the feral animal
grunts of the man behind him. He tilted his head slightly to see if
the walking nightmare was in his peripheral vision, all the while
keeping his body moving straight for the refuge of the sports utility
vehicle. He saw a flash of oily, thick, inky black hair matted with
blood and something else that looked like brain matter. It was moving
incredibly fast. His heart thundered in his ears as he pushed his
body for more, but it wasn't enough. He felt the cold hand clamping
down on his shoulder as spikes of panic raced through him, making him
numb.
There was something heavy
on the back of his legs, pushing the fabric of his suit pants into
the crease of his knees. He felt the back of his right shoe push hard
into his silky dress sock, and then come loose. The next thing he
knew something solid hit him in the lower back, right where he hurt
the most from sitting through long flights. Then the ground came up
unexpectedly rushing toward his face. He put out the palms of his
hands to break his fall. He felt a sharp sting as they connected with
the hard ground, drawing blood. He tumbled forward and the monster
clinging to him rolled with him like a heavy sack filled with foul
liquid. A strong smell overpowered him, and he realized it was coming
from the man. He came to a clumsy stop flat on his back, nearly
knocking the breath out of him. The palms of his hands screamed in
pain, but he held them up to force the man back. The smell of fresh
blood only seemed to drive the man further into a frenzy as he
snapped viciously at Edgar's face, leaning over and drooling what
smelled like rancid meat saliva, missing his face by near inches.
“Get off me!”
It was no use. There was
no longer any man left to reason with, no longer anything that
resembled a human being other than the sack of skin and bones that
pinned him to the ground. Edgar could feel his strength leaving him
as the monster leaning over him used the force of gravity and the
weight of his body to drive himself closer and closer to his face. He
turned his head and saw in the distance more creatures like the one
that was trying to kill him. They were sniffing the air like a pack
of wolves. Some had already caught the scent of fresh blood and were
now heading his way, picking up speed as they moved.
I
thought zombies were supposed to be slow and dumb,
he thought briefly before shoving back with renewed force against his
assailant. This isn't what I expected at all.
The realization came to
him suddenly – he didn't have much time left. If he planned on
living to see another day, he'd have to do something drastic and do
it fast.
“Here goes nothing,”
he said, reaching up and driving his thumb into the Asian man’s
left eye. To his great surprise, the man didn't even flinch. His
thumb slid into the eye socket and the man's eye squirmed out,
dangling by a series of fleshy threads until the gelatinous orb was
now inches from his own face. A trickle of dark fluid oozed down to
the ball and dripped onto Edgar's face. The man above him showed no
response to having his eye gouged out. Edgar wasted no time doing the
same thing with his other hand to the right eye. Using all the
strength he had, he drove his fingers in deep until he felt a spongy
material somewhere deeper inside the man’s skull. Driven on by
adrenaline and the will to live Edgar squeezed down, jamming both
thumbs toward each other. He could feel the muscles of his arms and
chest contracting painfully as he gave it all he had. He felt the
man's grip on him loosen slightly as he drove his fingers all the way
into the brain. With a great cry Edgar forced the man off him,
rolling over and hurling the disgusting corpse away from him. The man
crumbled into a ball, then rose again quickly and began wildly
searching for his victim. His eyes hung loosely from the
filth-covered strings in their sockets, dangling near his collarbones
like some kind of macabre kid's toy. He sniffed the air, knowing his
quarry was just nearby, but was unable to locate him. He threw back
his head and screamed out in anger, an inhuman cry that brought the
attention of the others now closing in.
If
they didn't know you were here before, he
thought, they sure do now.
***
UNDEAD LA 1 releases in paperback and ebook formats in September 2013. Check my AMAZON AUTHOR'S PAGE for updates. Thanks!
