Military . . . Colorado . . . ings . . . Peterson . . . Base . . . orld-Wi . . . portion has been . . . over . . . repeat . . . This is Military Radio in Colorado Springs broa . . . Kathryn Ber . . . st . . . president of the Uni . . . neath the White House . . . tion . . . ings under Military control . . .
Static soon took over. Jocelyn inferred from the garbled broadcast that the military was broadcasting from Colorado Springs, maybe from this Peterson Base, and someone she’d never heard of was President. “Portion has been” and “ings under Military Control” implied the military shielded some or all of Colorado Springs from this draugar scourge. Or perhaps even a larger area than Colorado Springs?
Saint Michael had said to focus on finding a pharmacy but hinted more tasks would come “down the road,” where she could prove valuable in the fight against the draugar. It occurred to her that if she reached Colorado Springs, she would have the safety to figure out her next step.
More importantly, she realized that as someone immune to the disease, she could possibly be studied to find a cure. Her life would be that of a lab rat, but it would provide her some redemption for killing those innocent people. Despite knowing that she was mentally ill, that she had been off her meds through no fault of hers, and that the spirits of the ones she had killed had forgiven her, feelings of guilt washed over her again, and she lay awake, trying to go back to sleep, but unable to shake the thoughts, the memories, of slaughtering those people.
She played out the recent events repeatedly in her mind. Her memories were a little fuzzy, and she remembered her therapist had told her her mind would block out some of the trauma her mental illness caused, but not all of it. But she remembered enough to torture herself with it throughout the night.
When she was able to, she tried to focus on the hope Colorado Springs represented. But hope could be a dangerous thing.
She had trouble sleeping the rest of the night, desperate to get another signal, but she couldn’t zero in on one to get any more information.
At first light, she ate a hot breakfast of canned chili while covered in a warm blanket. She gathered everything bloody—clothes, blankets, sheets, et cetera—and threw them into the laundry room.
She crammed a load into the washer and started it.
What if she was still crazy? Clinically insane? Still in a psychotic state? She shuddered. Even though she recognized the “normal” people she’d killed weren’t zombies, there were still a lot of unusual things going on.
Most people, despite identifying as religious, would conclude that her spirit guides were a delusion. Protestants didn’t believe in spirit guides. Catholics like herself believed in saints that would help you when prayed to them. But few ever thought the saints talked back to them, let alone appeared to them in meditation.
How does one tell the difference between mystical experiences—like meditation with spirit guides, shamanistic journeying, shamanistic healing—and being insane? And what if none of this was real? What if her conversations with Saint Michael were a delusion? What if there was no zombie apocalypse at all? What if George was not any kind of zombie, but just a sick man, or worse yet, perfectly normal? How would she know the difference?
And if she was insane, the best place to go would be to a hospital—not a pharmacy. Besides, hospitals had drugs just like pharmacies. In most cases, there was at least one pharmacy located close to a hospital. At least she figured there was.
She could tell the difference, though, between being sane and insane. When she was insane, she wasn’t self-reflective as she was now. Whenever she had a full-on psychotic break, it never occurred to her that what she was experiencing wasn’t real. So, given her awareness level, she most likely wasn’t insane. But could she take that chance? What if she killed more innocent people? Saint Michael had said the zombie apocalypse was real, but most people would say he was a construct of her mind.
Just how insane was she? What, if anything, that had happened to her was real?
Chapter Fifteen
Day Zero
Marty ran away from Amanda while loading one shell in the chamber, and as he turned around, he saw she was almost upon him. He pumped and shot her in the skull cavity from only five feet away.
His wife was about thirty feet behind. He loaded one more shell and fired at her once she got close, dropping her.
Marty backed away from the scene. The slickness of tears irritated his cheeks, and he absentmindedly brushed them.
He took a deep breath in and out and stared at his wife and daughter, their lifeless bodies on his front lawn, half their heads sprayed all over the grass.
He watched in fascination and horror as unblemished skin started to grow and cover what remained of their heads. But their heads weren’t growing, just the skin. More than half their brains were gone for good. Sores were breaking out.
They were going to re-animate soon. From what he remembered of the other zombies, it would be well before the skin growth was complete.
He continued to watch the skin grow. The passage of time didn’t register, but at some point, he remembered that his gun was unloaded.
Keeping his eyes on the grotesque things that used to be his wife and daughter, more out of grief than fear, he fumbled in his pockets for his ammo, grabbed one shell and filled the chamber with it.
He registered that no bones or hair were growing—just skin.
Amanda’s skin growth was further along than Karen’s. She would re-animate
