SURVIVORS OF THE DEAD: FROM THE ASHES Read Free

carefully. DO NOT come in! It’s too dangerous and we’re losing our people left and right. Make sure your place is buttoned up tight and don’t let anyone in under any circumstances. If you see anyone acting even remotely odd, and believe me you’ll know what that means when you see it, do not hesitate! Take them out immediately! Do you copy me?”
    T he events of the morning thus far with what he’d had to do in the lobby, and now hearing what O’Leary had just said, nearly pushed Harry over the brink! “What do you mean, shit’s going down all over the City?” Harry demanded. “I just had to blow away two old ladies in my lobby that were gnawing on a fucking UPS guy! Now you’re telling me if anybody acts odd I should take them out? What the fuck, Bob!”
    With an exasperated tone , Bob immediately said, “Turn on the TV, Harry, see for yourself.” Harry started to respond, but only got a couple of words out, before O’Leary interrupted him. “Listen Harry, I gotta go. You button up tight and you stay put until we can regroup and get the City back in control. We’ve got SWAT backed up with calls and every car is in a different location all over the City. There’s nothing you can do right now, so you wait for further instructions.” With that, O’Leary hung up. Harry could only look at the cell phone in his hand in complete astonishment.
    Staring intently at the television that was directly in front of him, he turned up the volume and started to surf the channels in total disbelief. What he saw was total anarchy. There were indeed scenes of mass rioting not only in San Francisco but also apparently all over the country, according to the national news networks. He settled on GNN when he ran across them in some sort of heated debate over what was happening.
     
    3
     
    Harry watched GNN for the better part of two hours, alternatively switching between that and the local channels. They all told the same story: something about a worldwide bioterrorist attack that had affected a large portion of the population. Those infected seemed to then attack and either kill or infect others. It didn’t make any sense to Harry, and obviously it didn’t make much sense to the talking heads reporting the information. As is normal in an emergency involving unknowns, everyone had an opinion on the cause. Shouting matches erupted on some networks between so-called respected experts generating conflicting reports, which seemed to only create more confusion. But the televised images themselves spoke volumes, overshadowing anything the experts or the studio anchors were relaying. Harry finally muted the television to allow what he had seen and heard to be absorbed a bit, and to gather his jumbled thoughts. That was also when the unrelenting pounding that seemed to resound throughout the building came crashing back into focus. He had only one thought: “What is this, fuckin’ Cujo meets Dawn of the Dead?” Walking over to the closed, heavy curtains in his bedroom and pulling back a small section, Harry peered out onto a scene of horror much like what he had been watching on TV.
    After viewing the craziness unfold on the street below his window for several minutes, Harry finally stepped back from the window with sudden determination. “Okay, so first things first; I need to check on the rest of the building.” Although he knew what he was assuredly going to find, he prepared himself as best he could. Walking over to a dresser, he opened the uppermost drawers, revealing several boxes of .45 caliber ammunition and four empty magazines. Pulling these items out of the drawer, he carefully lined them up in front of him on top of the dresser.
    Opening the boxes of ammunition, and then picking up the first empty magazine, he started to thum b in rounds. When he finished loading the four mags, he reached to the back of his jeans and pulled the Glock out from where it had been sitting in the small of his back since he had replaced it