Alan Dale - Death Nation's Army 01 (13 page)

Due to this error under duress, Moreland was next on Shah’s hit list as the maybe-not-dead man sprang from the operating table and launched himself at the doctor.

Banning stepped aside as Shah grabbed Moreland’s right arm to spin her around and within moments pulled it completely off from the shoulder through brute force.

Behind the scenes, Koko was seen taking her last breath as she died from the apparent blood loss. Shortly thereafter Moreland’s screams rose to inhuman decibel levels just as Shah flung the arm toward the wall, ultimately knocking out the sole video camera in place for the lab. The last thing anyone could make out was Shah moving into toward Moreland to take the blood from the gaping wound in her shoulder and take a bite of meaty, dangling flesh.

That was what one camera told of the story of Patient Zero.

The next part of the story came by way of the two cameras placed in the adjoining corridor to Lab 43.

A soldier, to date still unnamed, listened outside the lab, asking if everything was all right. Normally, he could not enter without the key codes from the doctors punched in from the other side, but the military had issued override protocols, unknown to the medical staff, in case of any type of emergency. This would allow any military personnel to enter at any time.

So after a few moments, the solider – watched from about 15 degrees off of his left shoulder – could be seen entered a code of some kind only moments after preparing his rifle to kill if this current drama required it.

As the door opened the viewer immediately heard growls, growls from at least two different voices.

Or was it three?

The solider took a step back and rushed to get his rifle in place.

“
Doctors…doctors…what…,” his shock was evident. The look of disgust and revulsion evident on his face. If one looked close enough, they could also see in the background a one nurse Koko taking bites of flesh from the arms of Doctor Banning, who appeared to still be alive.

Faintly, a male voice could be heard telling the soldier to “get out of here now…”

But the solider, trained to kill and deal with any threat no matter what kind they faced, wouldn’t budge.

“
Shah…Shah?” The solider yelled. “Quit…quit…

“
Quit, eating the doctor.”

Training his weapon toward the right side of the room, the soldier appeared to set his aim on something when the other soldier in the corridor finally made his way down to help.

“
What the hell is going on?” The newly arrived military man slapped the stunned first soldier on the shoulder, turning him around, forcing him to lose aim on his target.

Big mistake.

Moments later, both Shah and Doctor Moreland flew out of the room, hands raised, clutching the air, searching for a new victim.

And finding one.

Shah took the first soldier, grabbing him by the face and with brutal and unconscious force ripped the flesh from the young man, bringing more screams.

Moreland tripped moments before getting to the other solider but found fortune as her head landed at the feet of the intended target. The former doctor immediately scrambled and got a hold of the soldier’s leg and took a bite out of his thigh, pulling huge, stringy, pieces of flesh from bone. Even in his dying moments the brave soldier managed to get a couple of shots at Moreland, lying at his feet, placing two, new, gaping holes in his attacker’s back.

Yet, it made no difference at all, as more of the soldier’s thigh soon became another part of the meal.

Shah
managed to rip his prey’s head completely from the neck and found a way to peel back the scalp, feasting on such a young and once, full of potential, brain.

To make things even more horrifying - or as some NWO officials found, funny – was watching back in the room, the faint image of Doctor Banning, presumed dead, look up, sit up, watch Koko continuing to feast on his still warm flesh. Banning growled, backhanded the nurse and stopped the feeding frenzy almost immediately. It appeared they readied to fight one another before thinking twice and calling a truce. Hearing the sounds of death and feeding only feet away, the Koko and Banning scrats rolled around on the ground and moved toward a helping of soldier flesh.

Research found the s
crats eat the flesh of the newly dead for just a few moments before the cold takes over, the cocktail brings the victim to reanimation and the undead army added a new member.

It was said to have been about three minutes after the
second soldier died and became a meal to Moreland and Koko when he finally rose. This time, the soldier growled at his two dinner guests and the feeding stopped. Soon all three joined Shah and Banning at finishing off the beheaded military man. It took almost 20 minutes for the quintet to eat the body to the bone, leaving nothing behind, as entrails, flesh and sinew were all made a part of the full course delight.

Once done, the five slowly rose and found their way toward the direction of the corridor entry way.

Looking back at the video it took a few rewind attempts to figure it was indeed Banning who pushed the alarm at 12:54 p.m.

As the five killers, later to be called scrats, pounded on the door to be let out, foyer videotapes saw Romantine anxiously waiting for some kind of order. The foyer video tape’s audio was rendered inaudible due to the loud banging on the door to Wing B. Soon the other four military men securing wings A and C joined Romantine in the foyer, all obviously tense and also very ready to fight.

Records showed that at 1:11 p.m. Lt. Seamus Callaghan ordered the men to “engage.”

The video then shows Romantine keying in the code to open Wing B. What it also shows is in his panic, he never completely closed the door that led out of this particular segment of the facility.

At 1:12 p.m. with guns aimed and ready, the five soldiers ended up meeting with a force none would have ever imagined. They were immediately taken down by one scrat apiece, all becoming a victim to what slowly began to appear as an unending need to feed.

It took some time for the scrats to finish off the five hopeless soldiers, leaving three of the victims head-intact. Soon eight scrats rose off the floor, realizing all the available flesh had been devoured and seeing two corridors full of potential meals awaiting them. There was the open foyer door leading to the world at large and the scrats began their march in adding to their numbers and feeding their individual, black holes of hunger.

Alec Romantine could be seen stumbling out of the foyer and into the main entrance lobby of this particular building. As he did, he walked by his former work station and his glowing IPAD. An email from his, no longer girlfriend, had just arrived.

As it was reported earlier…Alec Romantine never emailed Barbara or anyone else, ever again…

It didn’t take long for the scrats’ numbers to grow. In minutes a bite and ultimate death, would lead to the rise of anot
her member of the cannibals which would soon attempt to inherent the earth.

Test Zone Zero stood no chance as the military never held a full presence with the numerous staggered shifts. The unarmed doctors were even more vulnerable as they along with their protectors fell. By the time enough armed military personnel arrived, a plenty
large number of scrats took liberties with the facility and made it their own.

It also didn’t help any when
Draco Fortellis was alerted to this event only moments after word of the alarm and subsequent video was brought to him.

Instead of sending more military out to the facility to combat the menace, he scrambled all radio contact out of Test Zone Zero so all calls for help would reach no one. The entrance and exits were locked down from Berlin and the slaughter was officially on. It took a few days for the entire facility to be tagged as “alive-free” before Fortellis made his final fateful decision to rid the Utopias of their revol
utionary and low class threat:

Set them loose.

With no people of any real importance living in Oceania and the headquarters of the revolutionary movements coming out of there,
why not? Fortellis, knowing the country was an island, guessed this would be the perfect distraction needed for the NWO. The pests beneath his feet would lose many of its high-ranking numbers to distraction of battling a new threat. The NWO would become of secondary importance due to having to deal with what’s in front of them. Topping that off would be a high casualty count and their movements would be setback months. Years. Sure, there was a network of revolutionaries placed all over the globe. But, this would be a major hit.

Besides, who cared about losing Australia, was Fortellis’ assertion at such a critical juncture.

Approximately
8,000 scrats remained inside the facility when the feeding ended. That was plenty to send out to start a new war. At least for the time being.

Ah, for the time being.

Set them loose.

And that, he did….

The feeding of the flesh had officially commenced.

Fortellis, of course, took for granted, at least during those first days of the scrat outbreak just how serious the threat promised to be.

Arrogance or a lack naivety may have played a large role in the scrats being allowed to run rampant throug
hout Australia. Many people followed enough old zombie movies to know to aim for the head, assuming the brain dictated everything, and appeared to guess right. Yet, as the scrats moved out of Test Zone Zero and moved toward the higher populated areas they easily increased their numbers as they plowed toward the major feeding grounds with the easy pickings in their nearby bedroom and rural communities.

Of course with no news of the security breech and the presence of a new threat not reported due to the executive decision made by Fortellis, no one was prepared for what was coming next. Many didn’t know the incubation period for the virus rendering a bite victim survivor to turn into a scrat. Many would be picked up on the side of the road by well-intended Samaritans who would le
arn only hours later they saved their own grim reaper. Some would gain passage on continental and intercontinental planes, aiming to flee in a panic and end up in a city 5,000 miles away biting everyone on their flight and leading a charge out onto Gate 4A. Instead of picking up postcards, persons at airports and train stations ended up taking home what many thought at first was a virus and decided to eat their kids rather than bring home a present

It only took New Zealand three days to first become affected as many arrived via boat or small planes trips. The spread continued and the
number of scrats rose in kind.

It was Candice Hemmerlee who called first.

“
This problem is out of control,” it took a lot for Draco not to cringe at the high pitched bark filtering out of his speaker phone. “We have a bunch of cannibals turning Australians into not-so happy meals, Draco.”

“
We call them scrats, my dear.”

“
God damned zombies!”

“
We don’t use that word around here.”

There was a short pause as Draco could here Candice take a drag from a cigarette.

“
Whatever,” she started again. “This is going to become a problem.”

“
How do you figure?” he asked her coolly. “It’s confined to Oceania and the revolution is on pause with their HQ under heavy duress using their resources to fight the threat. Besides we have order to shoot down any intercontinental flights out of the zone. ”You sure you can guarantee none of those disgusting things are going to get to any of the other continents?” Another drag. “To one of the damned Utopias, Draco? My Utopia? Yours?”

Draco took a moment, smile unseen.

“
I am feeling confident how this situation will play out,” Draco said. “Contingencies are in place.”

“
Oh yeah? Well I don’t think your cocktail testing practices had a kill zombie…”

“
Scrat.”

“
Scrat, zombie, fucking monkey! Your testing did not predict this I would bet,” Draco could hear Candice shake behind her silence as her breath blew, long, ragged. “They are about to wipe out an entire population, Draco.”

“
Not an important one.”

Another drag, longer this time. “Heartless, evil, prick,” Candice bristled. “This is a risk. A big one.”

“
And we are gearing up for a response,” Draco reassured her, his tone smooth, calm. “We are prepared to take care of the Utopias and in fact are military.”

“
Oh yeah,” another drag. “How?”

Draco sat down in his master chair in the Order meeting room and let the silence drag at the apparent irritation of the woman waiting on the line.

“
We are about to begin monthly inoculations for all military personnel and Utopian residents.”

“
Inoculations?”

“
Yes, Candice. Each person will receive the virus in a minimal dose, but enough to make any of us, worthy ones, not be detected if even in the same room of any of those things.”

Draco could hear Candice’s rage grow. He then realized she knocked over a few items wherever she happened to be at the time.