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  *****

  I woke up with my head thick with confusion. The lights were out. I sat up and rubbed the back of my head and instantly felt a knot. Whatever that crap was that I inhaled, it had taken me down and out.

  The scratching had stopped. There was no longer any of the red-pink mist coming in, either. I pulled out my phone and looked at the time in the upper corner.

  4:00 PM.

  I stared at the time. I held the phone up to my watch. It turned 4:01 as I watched it.

  I’d been out for almost eleven hours.

  I got to my feet with much difficulty. My body was already battered, and falling from a standing position hadn’t done me any good. I held my cell phone up to act as my guiding light, and stepped onto the toilet. I flipped the lock on the bathroom window and slid it up. It left me with around fourteen inches to squeeze through. The width would accommodate my shoulders, but just barely.

  I fed my arms through and positioned my head dead center with the hole.

  Behind me the scratching began again. I was glad I couldn’t see; it sounded like the fingers were ready to break clean through the hollow-core door slab, and I didn’t want to be in there when that happened.

  I pushed off, scrambling for a grip. Outside the window, my right hand found a conduit pipe and I wrapped my fingers around it, pulling with everything in me.

  A splintering sound came from behind me. Adrenaline surged through me and I kicked my legs with reckless abandon and let go of the pipe, trying with everything in me to swim my way through mid-air to get through that window. My body halfway through, I pushed off the exterior wall with both hands and launched myself out, just as I heard a primal growling from behind me. It didn’t sound anything like my Lin.

  I toppled down onto the dead grass below, and rolled. When I looked back up at the window I saw a gray hand with tattered, bloody fingers and no sign of fingernails left, clutching at the window ledge above me.

  I got to my feet and ran toward the back of the house.

  I needed to get to my guns. What I had heard and seen was not the Linda Mallette I knew anymore.

  *****

  I rounded the rear corner of the house and stopped, breathing hard. I checked myself out to make sure I hadn’t broken something during my fall out of the window and my adrenaline was just blocking the pain.

  I was alright. I closed my eyes for a second and tried to gather my more-than-usual scattered thoughts. What the hell had knocked me out for eleven hours? I couldn’t sleep for eleven hours in a row if someone smashed me in the head with a mallet.

  Yet somehow, I had.

  Just then I heard similar growls and what sounded like a yelp coming from behind my rear fence. I checked behind me and ran across the lawn. The window blinds were closed on our bedroom, so if Linda had wandered back there she wouldn’t see me. I reached the fence and peered between the old, weathered boards.

  Bill Frederick, a single guy who lived behind us, was crouched over his dog. It was a golden retriever named Sam, and at first, I wasn’t sure what I was seeing.

  Bill, who’d had us over for his 56th birthday party a couple of weeks before, was a bald, pot-bellied man who couldn’t top 5’2” tall. He was quick with a wave and didn’t have an enemy in the world that I knew of.

  “Bill, what the hell are you doing?” I yelled. “What’s wrong with Sam?”

  At first he didn’t raise his head. I squinted. I didn’t have my glasses on, but my first impression that I was witnessing the embrace of an injured dog by its owner was shattered in the next second.

  Bill raised his head toward me. Trailing from his teeth were the dog’s dripping entrails, and Bill’s mouth chewed relentlessly as he stared at me, as though trying to figure out what I was. My eyes fell to his hands, which continued to claw into the dog’s insides. He stared for another moment before dropping his head again. He burrowed his face deeper into the dog’s shredded abdomen and feasted.

  I doubled over and threw up.

  I staggered back from the fence and stood there, my heart racing wildly. After another few seconds of indecision, I spun around and ran back toward the house. I didn’t know what the hell to do.

  My wife had attacked me and was incoherent. Bill was… what? Rabid?

  I realized I still had my phone with me, so I stood there, my back against the exterior of our bedroom wall, and dialed 911 again.

  This time I got no automated message. It went straight to a fast busy signal.

  I stuffed the phone back in my pocket. It had charged all night, so was at 96% battery remaining. That was good, in case the emergency lines opened back up eventually.

  How many people like them were out there? Was this an illness?

  The questions ripped through my foggy mind. I needed to protect myself.

  I had a nice Benelli M4 12-gauge shotgun and a nickel-finished Sig Sauer 1911, along with plenty of boxes of .45 rounds and 12 gauge shells. I kept the shotgun in the back left corner of my bedroom closet and the Sig in my nightstand. When I ran out of the bedroom, I guess I was a little freaked out, so I didn’t think to grab my gun.

  Why the hell would I? Was I going to shoot my wife?

  A little freaked out. Hell. Under-fucking statement of the year.

  Anyway, the ammo was in a lingerie chest. The bottom drawer was granted to me by Linda for that purpose. I moved to the window. Linda often opened it in the night to let circulation flow through the house, and on more than one occasion she’d left it unlocked. I leaned down and curled my fingers beneath the window and pulled.

  Locked.

  “Damnit!” I shouted. A split-second later, the glass before me shattered outward, and I staggered backward. Linda’s body fell through it and landed atop me, even as I swung my fists wildly in my surprise.

  My fist connected with her face, knocking her back and off of me. I felt warm blood leaking over my chest, neck and face, and I again rolled over and sprung up from the ground like a sprinter. Once I got on my feet I ran into the yard and spun around.

  Linda was just getting back to her feet, and my eyes moved from her to the window, then to the back porch. My push broom was there. I charged for it.

  My wife staggered now; I wondered if she had hurt her leg or another part of her body as she had either fought with the police or fallen through the window. She wore only a thin nightgown that was soaked through with blood. Parts of her gown appeared to be shredded.

  I had no idea what had happened to the paramedics and police. There’s no way my Linda – my little, unimposing Lin - had done anything to harm them. They must have encountered something outside of our house or been called to another, more serious situation in progress.

  But what about all the gunshots? I should have heard more sirens approaching, but I didn’t.

  I got the broom in my hands, and turned to see Linda five feet away, a strange, pink glow in her eyes. I held up the broom and ran toward her, hoping she would veer away.

  She didn’t. The bristle end of the broom hit her chest and I pushed outward, hard. She staggered away, but let out this crazy shriek and came right back toward me.

  As she drew near, the pink mist reappeared and this time I could see the source: it poured from her eyes. I remembered what happened last time I got near that crap in the bathroom. I didn’t want to think what she would do to me if she had her way. In response, my brain answered the question.

  She’d do to you what Bill was doing to Sam. She’d tear you open and eat you.

  I jumped back and ran around her in a wide arc. I made a dash toward the bedroom window, fully aware that broken glass fragments littered the grass in front of it. About six feet from the house, I dove for the opening, flying over the shrapnel that would have shredded my bare feet.

  It was all I could do to make that jump. I felt the pain in every part of my fucked up legs, and when I landed, I did what I could to roll onto my shoulder and get back on my feet fast.

  Well it didn’t work out nearly as wel
l in reality as it did in my head. Instead, I landed on my chest and slid head-first into the base of the lingerie chest, stopping like a bus hitting a brick wall.

  The pain reverberated through my body, but I was more afraid of what would happen if I didn’t act quickly. I pushed through it, rolled over to a sitting position and leaned forward to pull open the bottom drawer of the chest.

  I scooted back and yanked the entire drawer out, spun on my ass and got to my trashed knees to drop it on our bed with a grunt. Then I struggled to my feet and ran to the closet on shaking legs. Sliding the door open, I leaned in and grabbed the shotgun.

  Back at the bed in seconds, I jammed my hand in the drawer and came out with a box of shells. I opened it and had time to get five shells loaded before Linda was at the window again, trying to push her way in.

  Rather than shoot her – I wasn’t there yet – I used the barrel of the Benelli to push her back. I heard her bare feet crunching through the glass just yards away from me, but she didn’t seem to notice.

  I yanked the nightstand drawer open and pulled out my Sig Sauer, stuffing that in the front of my pants. It was already loaded with a round chambered, like I always kept it.

  Linda was back. She fell through the window this time, the pink mist pumping out of her. I held my breath and kicked at her, trying to lift her head enough to kick her back through the window. I felt my foot slip and drag across her teeth, and jerked it back. The second my foot was clear, her teeth clamped together, and I watched as half of her tongue dropped to the floor at my feet.

  “Oh, God!” I shouted, my heart pounding as I jumped away. I raised the shotgun again and rushed her, using it to push her back outside. She toppled away and I turned and ran toward the closet. I yanked a tee shirt from the top shelf and threw it on, then pulled a small duffle bag from the closet floor, ran back and threw it on the bed, dumping the lingerie chest drawer full of ammo into it and zipping it closed.

  A second later, Lin flew through the window, sending the clinging glass shards into the room and landing, along with her body, between me and the dresser. I threw the shotgun’s strap across my shoulder, grabbed the duffle bag and leapt over her reaching hands as I ran for the front door. By the smashed bathroom door, I saw my boots – another thing I dropped where they came off when I got home from work – and leaned down to grab them on my way to the front door.

  I skidded to a stop. A cop stood there blocking the doorway. The door hung on one hinge, having clearly been kicked in by the responding officers. The middle-aged cop was staring at me, his neck ripped open and blood running down his uniformed chest. His eyes held the strange illumination, too. Behind me I heard a snarl and whirled around.

  I sidestepped into the living room; both Linda and the cop now staggered toward me; the cop’s gun was on the floor by the door. I raised the shotgun. “Stop,” I commanded, my voice shaky and weak.

  He didn’t.

  “Stop!” I croaked again.

  Linda moved from my left. The cop moved straight for me. I fired, blowing him back into the doorframe. I followed my shot, not wanting to confront my sick wife, and I ran into the brightness of the day once more. I glanced at my watch and saw it was now approaching 5:00 PM.

  “Hey!” shouted someone as I ran. I turned to see a young cop sitting in his police cruiser, the window partially down. I couldn’t understand why he hadn’t come out to help.

  I ran to him. “Why didn’t you help me!”

  “My partner tried to attack me. I emptied all my magazines at both of them! I shot my own partner at least nine times, and I shot that lady in there seven times. Nothing. No difference. Something’s really fucked up, man!”

  “You shot my wife?” I asked. “The woman in there?”

  “Yeah, I’m sorry, man. I told you, I shot my partner, too! He was the same as her! But man… it didn’t kill them! It barely even slowed them down!”

  I stared at him, but in my peripheral vision, I saw bodies emerging from my house. The cop was in front. I’d shot him in the chest with the shotgun. Dead hit in center mass. Gore hung in strands from the gushing wound.

  “Look!” shouted the cop, pointing from the car. “He’s still fucking alive. He’s got the keys to the car!”

  It made sense. I could tell he wouldn’t have sat out there passing the time for almost half a day if he had the keys.

  I raised the shotgun again, and this time I aimed for the deranged officer’s face. He charged toward me in what appeared to be a drunken stagger. I fired, and his head disintegrated into a mist of red.

  As he fell, Linda charged out behind him. She tripped over him and fell to the ground, her face smashing into the concrete walkway, her arm twisting beneath her and snapping like a tree branch. I felt sick to my stomach again when she got up and stared through me, her pink eyes were glazed and lost in madness.

  She gnashed her teeth and every time she opened her mouth I could see her half-bitten tongue.

  “Shoot her!” shouted the young, frightened cop. “Kill it!”

  Kill it. He called her an It.

  She was an It now I supposed. She wasn’t acting human anymore. I raised my shotgun and pointed it at her head.

  She stared, gnashed and snarled. I said a very quick prayer, quickly touched the St. Christopher medal that hung around my neck since the day I left the hospital so many years ago, and fired with my eyes closed and turned away so that I’d never have to see. When I opened my eyes, I saw the neighbor from two houses down – Byron Drake – staggering down the middle of the road. His eyes appeared to be locked onto me.

  “Get the goddamned car keys!” the cop screamed, and I charged back to where the officer lay still, bent down and unclipped the ring on his belt. I returned to the car, opened the door and heaved my duffle bag to the young officer. I fed my shotgun in and he rested it between his legs as I jumped into the driver’s seat, breathing hard.

  Drake was staggering toward me. He was now half a lawn away. My body ached. I hadn’t put myself through physical stuff like that since before the accident. I knew I wouldn’t be able to move at all once the adrenaline receded.

  “Drive to the station,” he said, relief on his face. “Please. Just drive us there.”

  “What the hell is that smell?” I asked.

  “Sorry,” said the young cop. “I… pissed my pants. I was in here for hours and I was freaked out. My partner was up against the car and like I said, I ran out of ammo.”

  I understood. I guessed I was just glad he hadn’t pissed in the driver’s seat. I put the key in the ignition and fired the engine. A moment later I floored the accelerator and got the car onto the street.

  *****

  CHAPTER TWO

  I was in a daze. My mind was spinning over what had just happened, and now here I was, driving a cop to the police station in his patrol car, a .45 stuck in my pants and the officer holding my shotgun.

  People – or things, because I had no idea what they had really, truly become yet – wandered into the streets, and I saw individuals and groups of them move toward our car as we passed. Lots of people were running and screaming, but the cop beside me just kept yelling, “Go around them! Go! Just drive!”

  I couldn’t put it together. None of it made any sense. I wondered how the other cop drove the car there if he was like Linda. He had to have changed after he arrived at our house, but how? Was it that fast? Linda had showed signs of whatever it was for hours before she changed. The cop that attacked me inside our house had bite marks on his body, but Linda wasn’t focused on him at all by the time I faced both of them. She only cared about getting to me, just like the cop. They both wanted to get to me.

  It took me back to the old Sesame Street show. One of these things is not like the others… I was the one thing. Tony Mallette wasn’t like them.

  There were a thousand more questions than answers, and I didn’t have the mental capacity to take them all on. I swerved and dodged, and even ran a few of the things down as they
staggered in front of the patrol car and were knocked to the ground by the heavy steel tube guard that had been mounted there.

  The streets were like some crazy nightmare all the way there. People were running and screaming all over the place. I moved to grab my .45 several times, but every time, the cop yelled, “No, just keep driving!”

  As a kid, I was trained to listen to cops, even if they looked like they were about to shit their pants. I glanced over at the guy in the passenger seat every now and then to see if he was about to give me some instruction, but he was freaked the hell out and seemed to only be competent at telling me what not to do.

  Yeah. If I was scared, this guy was petrified. I could see it in his eyes, his brain was squirming like an earthworm just dug out of the dirt.

  *****

  We got to the police station on Shelburne Road to find the same thing we’d found everywhere else: madness. The minute we pulled up, the staggering men and women things came at us from all directions. Just like in Bill Frederick’s back yard, many of the people, clearly so sick they didn’t have any idea what they were doing, crouched over fallen bodies, ripping into them like children tearing into a piñata stuffed with candy.

  I thought of poor Sam again. Bill loved the dog. Treated him like his kid. He had to be really fucked up to eat him. My mind began to work. I turned to the cop.

  “What are you gonna do?” I asked.

  He stared through the windshield. “Drive,” he said.

  “Look, I’m not your fuckin’ chauffeur. If I drive, I’m goin’ to my wife’s best friend’s house. Erica Swanson.”

  He stared blankly for a moment before answering. It was as though he’d settled on a solution. “Go.”

  I dropped the car into gear and drove. I checked my watch and saw that it was 5:35 PM. I turned to the cop. “What’s your name, man?”

  The guy looked down at his name tag that said T. Wiggenhauser. “Uh… Tom,” he said.