Dead, but Not for Long (17 page)

Keith had decided that it was best not to have her at the meeting. She’d distract the
bikers at the very least.

When he reached the cafeteria, it was full of activity. The staff had been so busy dealing with
the crisis that they hadn’t had much time to contemplate the enormity of their
situation. Now everyone was speculating. At Keith’s suggestion, Jack had the
attendees sign in before being seated. Everybody on the first and second
floors, besides Autumn and Lindsey, was either dead or missing. Those on the
upper floors had fared much better as Keith and Jack had halted the invasion
before it could spread. All totaled, 16 staff members were present, including
two general practitioners, one pediatric intern, one cardiologist, six nurses
if Marla was to be included, three certified nursing assistants, a physical
therapist, a janitor and one security officer. Besides the patients, there were
also several visitors, some of whom had decided to attend the meeting, and the
few bikers who weren’t busy distributing meals to the patients.

Jack told the crowd everything that he had learned and then he introduced Snake, who, along
with his men, would be helping with security.

A balding middle aged doctor took exception to the announcement.

Jack groaned silently when he recognized him. Dr. Winston was notorious for being difficult and
most of the medical staff hated to work with him.

“I’m not going take orders from a bunch of bikers. We hired you to do the job,” Winston said,
pointing a finger at Jack. “You have no authority to put gangsters in charge of our safety.”

“Well, Doctor, since I am only one man and this is an emergency, I do have the authority to hire
anyone I want to assist me with security. Perhaps you would rather be looking
behind your back every time you go to check a patient’s blood pressure. Or
maybe I should use the remaining CNAs and nursing staff for security so you can
spend your time giving sponge baths and changing bed pans.”

The doctor threw up his hands and sat back down, muttering to those around him.

“It appears we’ll be here for quite some time, so we’ll be working long hours,” Jack
continued. “I doubt that swing shift will be coming in, so we’ll have to make
some sort of schedule. We desperately need everyone here, but if anyone has to
go home and check on family members, I don’t think anybody will blame them.”

A CNA in the back stood up. “What would our chances of survival be if we leave?”

Snake stepped forward. “Like Jack said, it’s chaos out there. Chances are, if your families
are alive, it’s because they’re somewhere like this. Unless you live away from
population centers, you probably won’t find them at your homes, at least not
like you remember them, if you even make it there. There’s a snowball’s chance
that they are holed up at home, but if they are, you could be leading half the
undead population of Lansing to them.”

“Undead? Are you insane?” Dr. Winston said, jumping to his feet. “Do you think this is some kind
of horror movie? This is real life, buddy. The dead don’t get up and walk.
These people are obviously on some sort of drugs.”

Keith stood up. “All I know is that there was a man on my floor who had his heart torn out and
eaten, yet we found him crawling across the room.”

“Oh, please,” Winston said, rolling his eyes. “You’re just trying to start a panic.”

“Keith is right,” Jack replied. “I saw it, too. The man was dead. No doubt in my mind.”

The CNA who had helped them nodded in agreement. “There was no way he could have still been
moving, but he was. The guy had been completely gutted.”

“You probably saw a lump of flesh that you believed to be a heart,” Winston said.

“I know a heart when I see one,” Keith said.

“So they teach you that in nursing school, do they?” Winston smirked, looking around to see if
others found his comment amusing.

Keith took a deep breath but Snake stepped in before he could reply.

“Doc, I’m not sure how much you’ve seen here in the hospital, but I can tell you that this is
not just a bunch of people on drugs. My boys and I were out there. For one
thing, drugs aren’t contagious and this is. A person gets bit and they change, after they die.”

“Again, I’m sure it appeared that way to you,” Winston stated.

Snake shook his head. “We saw people walking around with their intestines hanging out; guys
with throats completely torn out. Just go upstairs and look out the window and tell me what you see.”

“Whatever. If it makes you happy, we’ll pretend they’re zombies,” Winston said, rolling his eyes
as he sat down.

The cafeteria door opened and a man with disheveled light brown hair walked in carrying a cup
of coffee. He was late but that didn’t surprise anybody since he always worked
on his own schedule. After one of the bikers stopped him and asked him to sign
in, he sat his coffee down and looked over the list then added “Nicholas Doune, brain surgeon.”

Rather than sitting, he stood at the back, sipping his coffee as the meeting continued.

“Has anybody been able to get any calls through?” an elderly visitor asked. “If we could
somehow contact our families that would help, so we know that they’re all right.”

“The hospital phones were all busy for the first few hours and now they seem to be dead,”
someone replied. “My cell phone works but nobody answered.”

“I got through on my cell,” a nurse named Marian said. “I called my sister and told her to get
her kids and get up into the attic with as much food and water as possible.
They’re all right for now, but I don’t know how long they’ll be able to stay there.”

There was a short debate over how long the epidemic might last and whether or not help
would come. When the discussion began to go off on a tangent, Keith spoke up.

“Let’s finish getting the security matters handled and get this schedule together then we can
open the floor to discuss whatever anybody wants to talk about. I’m going to
need to get back to my patients soon. Marla’s up there now,” he said, sitting
again.

Marian, a devout Catholic, quickly crossed herself.

“Who put you and the rent-a-cop in charge anyway?” Winston asked, standing again. “You’re just a
nurse. It seems like a doctor should be making the decisions around here.”

Winston rarely missed out on an opportunity to belittle others, and he often made comments to
Keith that could easily be taken as racist remarks. The doctor was usually just
careful enough not to cross the line. Keith took a deep breath, knowing that
the doctor was just trying to push his buttons. It wasn’t going to happen. He stood to make sure he could be heard.

Across the room, the doctor flinched when Keith stood.

“You stay right there!” Winston said, looking around frantically. “Where is security?”

Keith shook his head as laughter could be heard around the room. Most of those in the room knew
that while Keith could appear intimidating, just from his size alone, he was very easy-going.

“Nobody said we were in charge, Dr. Winston, but Jack and I were the ones that secured the top
four floors of the hospital with help from Lindsey and Autumn,” he added,
motioning toward them. “I sure didn’t see you lift a finger to help. And Snake
and his friends cleared out the bottom floor, which was totally overrun. We
secured this building at considerable risk to our own lives. I think that shows
that we can handle ourselves in a tough situation, and I think we’ve earned the
right to have some say.”

The doctor started to sputter a reply as Keith returned to his seat, but Dr. Sharma, the
young pediatric intern from India, stood up and spoke. “Keith is right. We’d
probably all be dead right now if not for those who cleared the building and
that includes the men with the motorcycles. We owe thanks to all of you that
helped. I honestly did not think that any of us would survive the day.”

Someone began to clap and soon the applause quickly drowned out Dr. Winston, who was still
complaining. He finally sat down, fuming as he glared around the room.

Jack had known concerns would be raised with the chain of authority, so he began to address the issue.

“We don’t plan to impose martial law here. There just have to be some rules if we’re all going
to get through this with all of our body parts intact,” Jack said, trying to
reassure his skeptics. “I admit, I haven’t paid much attention to the hospital
bylaws but I brought someone who has. Ernie, will you read everyone what you showed me?”

Everyone’s attention was directed into the corner. As the room fell silent, snoring could
be heard. Ernie’s mouth hung wide open and his head leaned against the corner
of the wall. The crowd chuckled as Jack rolled his eyes.

“Well, to paraphrase,” Jack continued, “in a state of emergency, which we are undeniably
in, all issues of security are the responsibility of the head of security, who
will answer only to the hospital administrator or board members. Since I don’t
see any of these people on this list,” he said, holding the sign-in sheet high
for all to see, “that gives me authority when it comes to matters of security
only. All other matters are up to the medical staff. So, if no one has any
security questions, I will yield the floor to the medical staff.”

~*~

Cheri stared in shock at Miguel as her world dissolved around her. A river of thoughts and
words flowed into her head, but she could only scream, “No!”

The word reverberated throughout the house. Eric and the kids heard the desperate cry
from the basement and ran upstairs. Cheri was on the floor, sobbing
uncontrollably while Miguel stood with his hands buried in his face. Hearing
the kids approach, Cheri did her best to regain her composure. Wiping her
tears, she turned to the kids and pulled them into her arms.

Miguel had been trying to stay unemotional. When the disease had infected the University, he
and several others had barricaded themselves in the biology lab. Amongst the
group were a couple of biology professors. They were in agreement that this
illness was probably transferred by bodily fluids, which could very well
include blood, saliva, sweat, and tears. Exposing his family to any of these
was a risk he couldn’t take. He wanted desperately to say goodbye, to give them
one last hug. But watching Cheri break down made the tears begin to flow. Now
he was poison. He cursed himself for being weak. He cursed himself for not
picking them up in his arms enough when he was healthy. Now, it was too late.
He knew he would never hold them again. He started to shake more violently and
he knew that he had waited too long. Stumbling to the door, he looked at his
family one last time. He wanted to say something, but nothing came out. Cheri
held the kids tightly and shook her head.

“Please, don’t go,” she begged him. “There’s got to be something we can do.”

He shook his head no, turning a pale white, and stumbled to his truck. Starting the
ignition, he slumped over the steering wheel and stepped on the accelerator.
Eric, Cheri, and the children ran outside to see the truck weaving back and
forth along the dirt road. Marie looked up at her mother and asked, “Is Daddy coming back?”

Cheri didn’t answer and as badly as Eric wanted to reassure the child, he had no reply. If
their father came back, it wouldn’t be a joyful reunion.

They watched helplessly as the truck sped down the country road, kicking up a cloud of dust
behind it. After weaving from side to side for about half a mile, it sharply
turned toward a drainage trench and then disappeared from sight in the cloud of dust that obscured it.

Cheri started to run toward the truck.

~*^*~

“I have a few suggestions with the schedule,” Keith said. “I think we should keep the night
shift to a minimum and let these poor patients actually try to get some sleep
during that time. We can use the empty rooms for staff to sleep in and we can
all be on call. This way we’d only have to worry about two shifts, not three. I
think we could get by with one nurse for the night shift if we do this.”

There was a bit of discussion amongst the doctors and Dr. Chan, the cardiologist, finally
stood. “None of us doctors have been involved in the details of scheduling for
the nursing staff. We’ll stay out of that and just work out our own rotation between the four of us.”

Dr. Sharma tugged at his lab coat and whispered something.

Dr. Chan glanced back toward where Dr. Doune was standing. “So there are five of us, apparently,
if Dr. Doune won’t mind helping us out.”

Nick shrugged. “I’ll help. We can talk about the schedule when the meeting is over.” He had no
problem with helping but it would be on his terms whether the others liked it or not.

Keith added, “We also have no dietitians and no cooks, though Snake and his crew have offered to
help with that. There are several other jobs that also need to be filled. If
some of the patients or visitors are able to help, talk to me, Jack or Snake
and we’ll find something for you to do.”

Jack walked to the front as the crowd began to disperse.

“If I could have your attention for one more second, Snake brought up a valid point. When night
falls, this may be one of the only buildings in the area with power, thus one
of the only buildings that is lit up. This will be a beacon for survivors all
over the area if there are any. Some of these people may come in with wounds,
scratches and cuts. You get the point. We need to have an area of quarantine
for these people where we can observe them and make sure they don’t infect the
hospital population.”

“We could use the ER,” someone suggested. “It’s going to be empty for a while.”

Jack nodded and said, “We also need to know a little about this epidemic, so we know how long
to quarantine, who to quarantine, etc. I’m no medical professional, but it
seems like this would be the perfect facility to study this epidemic.”