DISEASE: A Zombie Novel by M.F. Wahl Page A

Alex thinks his eardrums will burst. He jerks his head to the side.
Try a little harder, Alex,
he thinks as he squints at her, stares at the words coming from her face.
    “Don’t be afraid. You won’t be punished for what you did to the guard who shot Casey.”
    CASEY IS DEAD.
    Alex’s vision washes black, just for a second. He feels the bullet in Casey’s head, the searing, unbearable pain, as if it hit his own. Hot tears threaten to corrode his eyes. He fights them; jerks his head to the side.
Try a little harder, Alex.
    Lot is still talking.
Casey
, he hears,
Casey
. The words slur together, a blaring, off-beat orchestra. It’s too hard to focus as his stomach growls.
    Alex stares at Lot, rocking slightly, not blinking. She stands and steps aside, leaving an opening. Alex ignores the pain in his screaming muscles, it’s time to go. Lot holds up a hand. Her nails are clean, round, not ragged. Her hands are washed, soft, cared for.
    Alex looks up at her, she flashes her teeth. Her hand invites him to pass and he pushes by. Beyond the blaring candlelight the corridors are dark, long, open mouths—unending black holes that lack the comfort of the tiny closet. His stomach growls again.
    Lot crouches down next to the hesitant boy. He is scared, exhausted, and beat to dust. “Why don’t I make you a nice hot dinner, with all the trimmings, just for tonight, and I’ll help you on your way tomorrow.”
    Alex looks up at her.
She has sandwiches.
Her hand extends. After what seems like eons he slowly gives her his own small, grimy paw.
    She gathers up the empty plate and then hand in hand they walk away from the closet, the thick abyss eventually swallowing everything, even the guttering light of Lot’s candle.
     
    ***
     
    Danny lies on his bed, unmoving, staring blankly at the ceiling, his mind lost in the yawning catacombs of deep thought. He doesn’t know how long he’s been lying here or even if he’s fallen asleep. He traces his fingers along his wristwatch, not even noticing he’s doing it. All he knows is the dark spinning of his mind, and then suddenly, he is aware again.
    A pang of guilt shoots through his core. What did he think he was doing anyway? He wishes he could rewind, he wishes he never brought Casey here. He wants to stop thinking, wants to move, wants to do something.
    The watch ticks, it’s seconds going by too slowly. On its side is a small knob that winds it, but he always forgets. The watch was his father’s, and his grandfather’s before him, and he presumes, his great-grandfather’s. The waning noise makes the night’s events even more unbearable.
    Danny thinks back to when he was a few years younger than Alex. He was only seven then, it was his father’s funeral. With the watch hidden in his pocket, he sat alone in the front pew, where he could see his reflection in the shiny black veneer of the coffin. Next to it stood Lot, preaching to the small congregation. No one came to comfort him as he mourned quietly, tears streaming down his face.
    He remembers feeling each tick of the watch as the long hand swung around the dial, the space between each second causing his heart to seize up. He was deathly afraid the uneven beat would stop, that the watch would die. All it really needed was to be rewound, but in his grief-stricken state, it felt like a living thing with a pulse, as though the watch were his father, and if the watch died his father was really gone, for good.
    Danny could only think of the watch as Lot preached to the congregation. She used to be more “fire-and-brimstone” then, and less “rebuild in our vision”. The eulogy was mostly about the wicked world and had little to do with Danny’s father. How could it? She had barely known the man. The end would come soon, she said—soon was relative, but she was right.
    There were less people following her in the beginning. Just a handful, about fifteen, including himself, if a seven-year-old counted. Now she has over one