Under a Graveyard Sky

“Which means two zombies,” Kaplan said, standing up. “I’ll take my team.”

* * *

“Faaaith,” Kaplan said, standing in the hallway with his hands on his hips. “I’m sure your uncle told you: no more zombie hunting?”

“She went zomb on the God damned elevator!” Faith swore. She’d finally gotten the woman into a hold where she couldn’t roll down between the cubicles with her legs scissored and one arm up behind her back. Not to mention the apparently entirely useless chokehold. She still wouldn’t quit squirming and Faith was just sooo impressed with all the help she’d been getting meaning NONE. “JUST TRANQ ’ER!”

Kaplan obligingly bent over and jammed a tranquilizer injector into the woman’s thigh.

“See, that’s how these things work,” Kaplan said. “The red end is the end the needle comes out.” He took a spandex bag from one of the other guards, who were looking equally amused, and slipped it over the woman’s head. “And now she’s not bitey.”

As the woman went flaccid, Faith pushed her away and rolled up and to her feet.

“Please don’t let me have any cuts,” she said. “Other than, you know, the hole in my thumb. I bashed her over the head with my mail cart but it didn’t stop her. And then she was bleeding all over me from the cut on her head.”

“We’ll get you down to decontamination, then,” Kaplan said, seriously. “I hadn’t realized it was that bad.” Faith’s front was covered in blood.

* * *

“I just thought about a problem,” Faith said.

The decontamination shower was, to her surprise, just a shower. Tile lined the whole bit. With funny tasting and smelling water. She’d been instructed to wash thoroughly with soap and that was about it. Kaplan had squirted betadine onto her thumb, again, for all the good it would do.

“And that is…?” the female security guard who’d been left with her asked.

“I don’t have any clothes with me except what I was wearing,” Faith pointed out.

“For future reference in your later years, I’ve always found it’s best to know what clothes I’m putting on before I take clothes off. Just a tip.” The guard’s voice was amused

“Very funny,” Faith said. “My clothes were covered in zombie blood. I couldn’t get them off fast enough.”

“I noticed,” the guard said. “I’ll go see if we’ve got a set of tacticals in your size.”

“Guy’s medium usually works,” Faith said with a sigh. It wasn’t her fault she was cursed with gigantism. “Hey! And clean please!”

“I’ll see what I can do…”

“Assuming I don’t have zombieitis and have later years,” Faith said, quietly.

* * *

Steve picked up his phone at Tom’s ringtone. It was about time for a daily check-in. So far there had been no major incidents reported.

“Hey, Tom, how’s it going…? Uh, huh…” he said, neutrally. “Right… Okay… How’s she doing?”

Stacey’s head came up from reading her iPad at “how’s she doing?”

“Okay… And this happened how?” There was a long pause. “Hang on, Stacey’s looking bug-eyed.” He looked up and shrugged unhappily. “Faith ran into a zombie. Turns out it wasn’t the first time. Which everybody had carefully not mentioned. She’s…possibly infected.”

“Oh, my God,” Stacey said, standing up. “I need to go onshore!”

“Tom, you’re my brother. And God knows there have been things I’ve done in my time that…” Pause. “Agreed. And my only real response is what you said. How the hell did that fall under ‘I’ll make sure she’s safe…?’” He paused and listened and then nodded. “Okay. Agreed. Yes, it is Faith after all. Yeah, I know. Yep… That’s Faith in a nutshell. Stacey wants to go onshore. Is there a way…? Okay. Got it. Yeah. Bye.”

“He’s sending a boat over,” Steve said. “With security for you. They’re at the apartment. I guess you can stay there tonight. There’s still no curfew but you don’t want to move around at night.”

“What happened?” Stacey asked.

“I…think I’ll let Faith explain,” Steve said. “Apparently Tom’s been trying to keep her from zombie hunting and failing. When she did finally give it up, some secretary went zombie in an elevator. Faith wasn’t bitten but she got blood all over herself and she already had some wounds from the previous bouts. So they’re afraid she’s infected. Good news is that she’s had the vaccine so they’re hoping between the small amount of infection and the vaccine she’ll pull through. Hoping.”

“I’m already packed,” Stacey said, then paused. “That means you’ll have to man the boat by yourself…”

“I’ve got it,” Steve said. “I can handle a few sleepless nights. Thank God for coffee as long as it holds out.”

* * *

“There’s good news and bad news,” Dr. Curry said.

A set of tacticals had been found in her size. Ditto tactical boots. Faith was planning on dressing that way from now on. Screw “street clothes.”

“Don’t keep us in suspense,” Tom said.

“Her blood test is positive for antibodies, but…” he said, holding up his hand to forestall the responses, “that would be the case anyway. She had the primer vaccine. That probably means that those were present from her immunization shot. However, she may have gotten a solid shot of D4T6…”

“What?” Faith asked.

“That’s the new designation for the beta expressor virus,” Sophia said. “Zombie virus in other words.”

“Oh.”

“So we’ll take the full Pasteur route,” Dr. Curry said, holding up a syringe. “This is the primer. Again. In two days you would have had the booster. We’ll give you a shot a day of primer or booster for two weeks. That should adequately prime your system even if you did get some viral load from your scuffle. And by pumping your body full of the attenuated virus, it will force your immune system to respond. Hopefully faster than the virus can take you over. We’ll also increase your potassium supplements, pump you full of antivirals even though their effect is limited and give you a B-12 shot to bump your immune resistance.”

“And you’re going to have to go into quarantine, here,” Tom said. “The room’s fairly comfortable but it’s, face it, a cell. If you haven’t turned by tomorrow…”

“Okay,” Faith said, miserably. She looked around. It was only the four of them in Tom’s office. “Is it cool to talk about ‘you know’?”

“Yes,” Tom said.

“Then if I do turn, I want to get turned into vaccine,” Faith said, looking at the floor. “That way maybe somebody else won’t.”

“That’s not going to happen…” Tom said.

“Uncle Tom…” Faith responded.

“I don’t mean what you think,” Tom said, holding up his hand. “You are not going to turn. You’re not. We’re not going to let that happen.”

“But if it does,” Faith said, tearing up.

Sophia leaned over and pulled her into her arms, hugging her.

“I’ll make it myself,” Sophia said, choking up. “And we’ll save it for special people.”

“Thank you,” Faith sobbed.

“Okay,” Dr. Curry said. “If we’ve gotten that out of our system, we need to start the procedures.”

Faith stood up and rolled up her sleeve.

“Go ahead and shoot me up, doc…”

* * *

“How you doing?”

Despite all their “additional duties,” Durante and Kaplan had volunteered to maintain watch on Faith.

“Sort of like a rat in a trap,” Faith said.

The cell wasn’t particularly small or uncomfortable as such things go. But it was still a cell.

“And when I have to go, you’d better not be watching the pick-up,” she added. “Do I really have to be on