He spins the stand around on its wheels, causing him to overlook the jumping handle on the door as he passes it.
He’s had the job a couple of months now. It was only supposed to be a summer gig, but the pay is decent, so he might stick around a little while longer than planned. Also, he actually enjoys the work. Most of the time he’s left to his own, pushing stands and beds and wheelchairs back and forth, going up and down the elevators.
It might not be the coolest thing in the world—being twenty-four and still having no education. But he doesn’t want an education. His plan is to go to the States and get an apprenticeship with a tattoo artist, then come back and open his own parlor. He already visited Miami once, that’s where he got most of his right arm done.
He reaches the laundry and leaves the stand, grabbing an empty one on his way back. This time, as he passes the door with the jumping handle, he notices the movement out of the corner of his eye.
What the hell …?
He stops and stares at the handle. It’s not moving anymore. He decides he probably imagined it and is about to move on, when the handle jumps again.
William pulls off the headphones to listen. From the other side of the door he can hear scraping noises. Like someone is fumbling around a dark room trying to get out. As far as he knows it’s just an equipment locker.
His first thought is that some poor sick dude has strayed down here and locked himself inside by accident. Maybe one of the dementia patients.
“Hang on,” he calls out, pulling the key chain from his belt. “I’ll get you out.”
He sticks in the key and turns. He pushes the door open cautiously, not wanting to knock down whoever is on the other side. To his surprise, the lights are on in the room. A foul, metallic stench rolls out at him, the unmistakable smell of blood has filled the small room, mixed with something sour and salty; sweat and fever, William guesses.
But what he sees instantly causes him to forget about the smells.
At the center of the room is lying a guy his own age, dressed in a hospital gown and entangled in a tipped-over wheelchair. Both his wrists appear to be tied to the chair, making him unable to get to his feet. Instead, he twists and turns, apparently trying to get free. His head is turned away, and the floor around him is stained with blood.
“Holy fuck,” William whispers and is just about to step inside the room to help. Something terrible obviously went down in here. The guy didn’t just wander down here on his own; someone tied him up and tortured him.
But some deeper instinct holds William back. Perhaps it’s his brain recalling at the last second the jumping handle.
And then the girl steps out from behind the door.
A few years younger than him, she might once have been quite pretty, but now she’s a terrible sight. Her skin is greenish and her eyes have neither pupils nor irises. Most of the fingers on her right hand are missing, turned into a mess of knobby bones and black, dried-up blood. It’s almost as if the girl wants to show him her damaged hand, because she reaches it out at him, while showing a row of perfect white teeth in a hungry snarl and comes towards him.
William yells out and flings his fist at her. He doesn’t have time to think, he’s acting out of pure reflex from his boxing practice. His knuckles connect with the girl’s cheek, giving off a loud smack and sending her tumbling backwards.
She hits the guy in the wheelchair, but he doesn’t seem to notice. He just keeps struggling to get free, turning his head and growling at William, revealing a face as terrible as the girl’s, but with the added effect of a lot of dried blood around his mouth.
William’s brain adds up everything in a flash. The guy bit off the girl’s fingers. The blood on the floor is from her. She must have brought him here and tied him up for some reason, but got too close. Then, while bleeding profusely, she tried to unlock the door, but couldn’t do it because of her busted hand.
During those three endless seconds William spends rooted to the floor in the open door, the girl meticulously gets back up and starts staggering towards him, one cheek visibly marked by his punch, but she shows no sign of pain.
William reaches in, grabs the door, slams it shut, and turns the key. A second later, the girl starts once again fumbling with the handle.
William breathes rapidly and stares down the hallway in both directions, making sure he’s alone. There’s no trace of doubt in his mind as to what he just saw: the girl and the guy in the equipment room are zombies. He has played with the thought of what he would do in this situation a hundred times, and now he’s actually here. The most terrifying fantasy has come true.
The zombies are coming!
TWO
Even though it’s only eight o’clock, the sun is already up and doing its worst. The air conditioner is blasting away, and still the temperature inside the bus is too high. Mille is sweating.
She’s nevertheless looking forward to the trip. Just the fact that she gets away from home for a week, gets to see new things and experience new places. Of course, the heat wave has hit most of Europe, including Prague, so the awful warm weather won’t be any different, but still—
A paper airplane hits her chest.
“Hey!” she yells out and looks up.
No one really seems to hear her. Everyone is busy chatting, listening to music or messing with
