and the crimson of muscle beneath.
Swallowing heavily, Leon quickly switched the gun
to his left hand and crouched down next to her. The
cool, clammy skin yielded easily beneath his finger-
tips as he touched her throat, pressing his first two
fingers against the carotid. A few seconds passed,
seconds that made him feel horribly young and afraid
as he tried to remember the procedure for CPR and
prayed, at the same time, that he would feel a pulse.
Five compressions, two short breaths, keep my el-
bows locked and come on please don't be dead. . .
He couldn't find it, and didn't want to wait one
more second. He tucked the Magnum into his belt
and grabbed her shoulders to turn her over, to check
for breathing, but as he started to lift, he saw some-
thing that made him lay her down again, his heart a
twisting knot in his chest.
The victim's shirt had pulled out of her pants
enough for him to see that her spine and part of her
ribcage were exposed, the still-fleshy knobs of verte-
brae shining and red, the narrow, curving ribs disap-
pearing into masses of shredded tissue. It was like
she'd been knocked down and . . . chewed on. Infor-
mation that Leon had disregarded as unimportant
suddenly registered, and even as the few facts he had
clicked into place, he felt the first inky tendrils of real
fear slither into his mind.
The crows couldn't have done this, would've taken
them hours, and who the hell ever heard of crows
flocking after dark to eat? And that shit-smell, it's not
coming from her, she died recently, and. . .
Cannibal. Murders.
No. No way. For that to happen, for a person to
have been killed and then partially—devoured on a
city street with no one to stop it. . .
. . . and with enough time to pass for scavengers to
come - for that to happen, the killers would have had
to slaughter most if not all of the population. Doesn't
seem likely? Fine. Then what's that smell? And where
is everyone?
Behind Leon, there was a low, soft groan. A shuf-
fling footstep, and another sound. A wet sound.
It took him barely a second to stand and turn,
hand instinctively snatching for the Magnum. It was
the couple, the drunks, staggering toward him, and
they'd been joined by a third, a beefy-looking guy
with ... with blood all over his shirt and his hands. And
dripping out of his mouth, a rubbery red mouth set
into his pasty, rotting face like an open sore. The
other man, the big man with the work boots and
suspenders, looked much the same and the vee of
the blond woman's pink blouse revealed cleavage that
was spotted with darkness, with what appeared to be
mold.
The trio stumbled toward him, past his Jeep, rais-
ing pale hands as they emitted moaning, hungry wails.
Some dark fluid gurgled out of the beefy man's nose
and ran across his moving lips, and Leon was over-
whelmed by the understanding that the terrible, shitty
smell was decayed flesh, and it was coming from
them. . .
. . . and there was another one, stepping out from a
door stoop across the street, a young woman in a
stained T-shirt, hair tied back from a slack and
mindless face.
A groan from behind him. Leon shot a look over his
shoulder and saw a youth with dark hair and rotting
arms shamble out from the sidewalk darkness of an
awning's shadow.
Leon raised the Magnum and aimed at the closest,
the man with suspenders, while his instincts screamed
at him to run. He was terrified, but his trained logic
continued to insist that there was an explanation for
what he was seeing, that he was not looking at the
walking dead.
Control, procedure, you're a cop. . .
"All right! That's far enough! Don't move!"
His voice was strong, commanding and authorita-
tive, and he was wearing his uniform, and God, why
wouldn't they stop? The man in suspenders moaned
again, blind to the weapon pointed at his chest and
still flanked by the others, now less than ten feet away.
"Don't move!" Leon said again, and the sound of his own panic made him back up a step, darting his
gaze left and right, seeing that there were still more of
the wailing, lurching people coming out of the shadows.
Something grabbed his ankle.
"No!" he shouted, whipped the gun around -
- and saw that the corpse of the hit-and-run victim
was scrabbling at his boot with one blood-crusted
hand, working to drag her crippled body closer. Her
gasping cry of frantic hunger rose to join those of the
others as she tried to bite into his foot, bloody smears
of saliva drooling off her abraded chin, dripping onto
the leather.
Leon fired into her upper back, the sharp, explosive
crack of the massive weapon loosening her grip and
at such close range, probably obliterating her heart.
Spasming, she dropped back to the pavement -
- and he turned and saw that the others were less
than five feet away, and he fired twice more, the
rounds splattering red flowers into the chest of the
closest. The entry wounds spouted scarlet.
The man in suspenders was hardly fazed by the
twin gaping holes in his torso, his stagger faltering for
only a second. He opened his bloody mouth and
gasped out a hissing mewl of hunger, hands raised
again as if to direct him to the source of relief.
Must be on something, firepower like that could drop
an elephant. . .
Backing away, Leon fired again. And again. And
again. And then the empty clattered to the pavement,
another was slammed in, more rounds fired. And still
they kept coming, oblivious to the shots that ripped at
their stinking flesh. It was a bad dream, a bad movie,
it wasn't real and Leon knew that if he didn't start
believing, he was going to die. Eaten alive by these. . .
Go ahead, Kennedy, say it. These zombies.
Blocked from his Jeep, Leon stumbled away, still
firing.
FOUR
SO MUCH FOR THE NIGHTLIFE; THIS PLACE IS
deadsville.
Claire had seen a couple of people wandering
around as she'd pulled into Raccoon, though not
nearly as many as there should have been. In fact, the
place seemed spectacularly deserted; the helmet
blocked out a lot of visual evidence, but there was
definitely a lack of business going on at the east end of
town. A lack of traffic, as well. It struck her as weird,
but considering the disasters she'd been imagining all
afternoon, not all that ominous. Raccoon still existed,
at least, and as she headed for the twenty-four-hour
diner off Powell, she saw a fairly large group of partyers walking down the middle of a side street.
Drunken frat boys, if she remembered her last visit
clearly. Obnoxious, but hardly the horsemen of the
apocalypse.
No bombed-out ruins, no dying fires, no air-raid
sirens; so far, so good.
She'd planned to head straight for Chris's apart-
ment before she realized that she'd be passing Em-
my's on the way. Chris couldn't cook worth a damn;
consequently, he lived on cereal, cold sandwiches,
and dinner at Emmy's about six nights a week; even if
he wasn't there, it might be worth it to stop in and ask
one of the waitresses if they'd seen him lately.
As Claire pulled the Softail to a gentle stop in front
of Emmy's, she noticed a couple of rats scurrying for
cover from atop a garbage can on the sidewalk. She
put down the stand and unstraddled the bike, taking
off her helmet and setting it on the warm seat.
Shaking out her ponytail, she wrinkled her nose in
disgust; from the smell of things, the trash had been
sitting out for quite a while. Whatever they were
throwing away gave off a seriously toxic stink.
Before going in, she chafed her bare legs and arms
lightly, as much to warm them as to wipe off the top
layer of road grime. Shorts and a vest were no match
for the October night, and it reminded her once again
of how dumb she'd been to ride bare. Chris would
give her one hell of a lecture ...
... but not here.
The building's glass front gave her a clear look at
the well-lit, homey restaurant, from the bolted red
stools at the lunch counter to the padded booths
lining the walls and there wasn't a soul in sight.
Claire frowned, her initial disappointment giving way
to confusion. Having visited Chris pretty regularly
over the last few years, she'd been to the diner at all
hours of the day and night; they were both night owls,
often deciding to go out for cheeseburgers at three in
the morning - which meant Emmy's every time. And
there was always someone at Emmy's, chatting with
one of the pink polyester-clad waitresses or hunched
over a cup of coffee with a newspaper, no matter what
time it was.
So where are they? It's not even nine o'clock. . .
The sign said Open, and she wasn't going to find
out standing in the street. With a last glance at her
bike, she opened the door and stepped inside. Taking
a deep breath, she called out hopefully.
"Hello? Anyone here?"
Her voice seemed somehow flat in the muted
silence of the empty restaurant; except for the soft hum of the ceiling fans overhead, there wasn't a
sound. There was the familiar smell of stale grease in
the air, but something else, too - a scent that was
bitter and yet soft, like rotting flowers.
The restaurant was L-shaped, booths stretching off
in front of her and to the left. Walking slowly, Claire
headed straight; at the end of the lunch counter was
the wait station, and past that the kitchen; if Emmy's
was open, the staff would probably be hanging out
there, maybe as surprised as she was that there were
no customers . . .
. . . except that wouldn't explain the mess, would it?
It wasn't a mess, exactly; the disorder was subtle
enough that she hadn't even noticed it from outside.
A few menus on the floor, an overturned water glass
on the counter, and a couple of randomly strewn
pieces of silverware were the only signs of something
amiss, but they were enough.
To hell with checking out the kitchen, this is too
weird, something is seriously fucked up in this city or
maybe they got robbed, or maybe they're setting up for
a surprise party. Who cares? Time for you to be
elsewhere.
From the hidden space at the end of the counter,
she heard a gentle sound of movement, a sliding
whisper of cloth followed by a muffled grunt. Some-
body was there, ducked down.
Heart thumping loudly, Claire called out again.
"Hello?"
For a beat, there was nothing - and then another
grunt, a muted moan that raised the hair on the back
of her neck.
In spite of her misgivings, Claire hurried toward the
back, suddenly feeling childish for her desire to leave;
maybe there had been a robbery, maybe the custom-
ers had been tied up and gagged - or even worse, so
badly injured that they couldn't cry out. Like it or not,
she was involved.
Claire reached the end of the counter, pivoted left. . .
. . . and froze, eyes wide, feeling as though she'd
been physically slapped. Next to a cart loaded with
trays was a balding man dressed in cook's whites, his
back to her. He was crouched over the body of a
waitress; but there was something very wrong about
her, so wrong that Claire's mind couldn't quite accept
it at first. Her shocked gaze took in the pink uniform,
the walking shoes, even the plastic name tag still
pinned to the woman's chest, what looked like "Julie" or "Julia." ...
... her head. Her head is missing.
Once Claire realized what was wrong, she couldn't force herself to un-realize it, as much as she wanted
to. There was only a pool of drying blood where the
waitress's head should have been, a sticky puddle
surrounded by fragments of skull and dark mashed
hair and chunks of miscellaneous gore. The cook had
his hands over his face, and as Claire stared in horror
at the headless corpse, he let out a low, pitiful wail.
Claire opened her mouth, not sure what would
come out. To scream, to ask him why, how, to offer to
call for help - she honestly didn't know, and as the
man turned to look up at her, hands dropping away,
she was stunned to hear that nothing came out at all.
He was eating the waitress. His thick fingers were
clotted with dark bits of tissue; the strange and alien
face he raised into view was smeared with blood.
Zombie.
A child of late-night creature features and campfire
stories, her mind accepted it in the split-second it
took for her to think it; she wasn't an idiot. He was
deathly pale and ripe with that sickly-sweet scent of
decay she'd noticed earlier, his eyes cataracted and
gleaming white.
Zombies, in Raccoon. I never expected that.
With that calm, logical realization came a sudden
rush of absolute terror. Claire stumbled backwards,
feverish panic turning her guts into liquid as the cook
continued to turn, rising from his crouch. He was
huge, easily a foot over her 5'3", and broad as a
barn . . .
. . . and dead! He's dead and he was EATING her,
don't let him get any closer!
The cook took a step toward her, his stained hands
clenching into fists. Claire backed up faster, almost
slipping on a menu. A fork clattered away from
beneath one boot.
GET OUT NOW.
"I'll be on my way now," she babbled. "Really, don't bother to show me out. . ."
The cook staggered forward, his blind eyes glowing
with dumb hunger. Another step back and Claire
reached behind her, felt air, felt nothing -
- and then the cool metal of the door's handle. A
shot of adrenaline triumph bolted through her as she
spun, snatched at the handle...
... and screamed, a short, sharp cry of horror. There
were two, three more of them outside, their disinte-
grating flesh pressed to the glass front of the diner.
One of them had only one eye, a suppurating hole
where the other should have been; another had no
upper lip, a ragged, permanent grin scrawled across its
lower jaw. They clawed mindlessly at the windows, their ashy, ravaged faces awash with blood - and
from the shadows across the street, dark shapes
shambled out into the open.
Can't get out, trapped ...
... Jesus, the back door!
From the edge of her vision, the glowing green exit
sign shone like a beacon. Claire spun again and barely
saw the cook reaching out to her from a few feet away,
her full attention fixating on the only hope of escape.
She ran, the booths whipping by in a flash of unseen
color, her arms pumping for speed. The door opened
out into the alley, she was going to hit it running and
if it was locked, she was screwed.
Claire slammed into the door and it flew open,
crashing into the brick wall of the alley ...
... and there was a gun pointed at her face, the only
thing that could possibly have stopped her at that
second, a man with a gun ...
She froze, raising her arms instinctively as if to
ward off a blow.
"Wait! Don't shoot!"
The gunman didn't move, the deadly-looking weap-
on still aimed at her head ...
- gonna kill me -
"Get down!" the gunman shouted, and Claire
dropped, her knees buckling as much from the com-
mand as from the cold fingertips suddenly groping at
her shoulder ...
Boom! Boom!
The gunman fired and Claire snapped her head
around, saw the dead cook falling backwards from
directly behind her, at least one massive hole now in
its forehead. Sluggish spurts of blood jetted from the
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