Outbreak (Part Two to Lockdown)
2014 © All Rights Reserved
The hardships of a drag queen who is out of breaks and on the fabulous clock 24/7.
Haha just kidding. Could you imagine? Drag queens are fabulous, someone make this story please. I'll love you forever.
Real description time now:
The side of the story from Tara's mom, Caroline as she witnesses the outbreak at the hospital and tries to fight her way out of it.
The idea to write it from the mom's point of view was suggested by @ArtyMacParty :)
Caroline had just dropped her daughter off at the school for the lockdown and was now heading to her other pride and joy, work. Most nurses and doctors she eavesdropped on had constantly complained about the long hours and having to work there all the time with barely any free time to themselves. That's the real world. Caroline wanted to tell them. She had taken pride in her job, helping others and shown up to her work everyday with the same smile. It never faltered.
But something about today felt different. A part of her didn't want her daughter to go to the school dance, she kind of wanted to stay home, call into work sick and watch movies all night with her daughter.
But this was her life, she had to provide for her daughter and herself. The hospital was located just around the corner of Tara's school. The town was so small, houses and buildings were always so close to each other.
She seen a person in a hospital outfit running down the road. Her eyes squinted at the man, but decided it was best to just keep driving. It wasn't her patient, therefore it wasn't her problem. The window to her car was rolled down and could make out what he was yelling, "Early bird gets the worm!" Without another thought on the man, she drove away from him.
Caroline arrived at the hospital in the parking garage then took the elevator from the parking garage up to the hospital floor where she usually works. Floor 5.
The elevator shook slightly, lights above her flickering. It slowly brought her up to the floor where she needed to be and the elevator abruptly stopped when it made it to her destination.
Caroline stepped out, the quietness of the normally noisy floor made her feel odd. No one was behind the reception desk that she could see. The hallways were empty. Not a single noise was to be heard, it made her feel uncomfortable.
"Hello?" She peered over the desk.
"Caroline!" A familiar voice shouted from behind her, it was her good friend Toria.
"Shit, you scared me," Caroline held her hand on her chest. "Where is everyone?"
"They moved the only few patients from this floor up to Floor 6. We're needed there today." Toria said as she made her way over to the elevator Caroline stood in front of.
"Oh, I wasn't informed of this." She said then walked into the elevator as the doors opened.
"I only found out because another doctor told me." Toria told her as they stood quietly in the elevator. The lights were flickering again and for some reason it disturbed Caroline, they've never done that before.
"What's with the lights today?" Toria commented while looking up.
Caroline shrugged, "Maybe they need new bulbs."
They reached Floor 6 and walked out. The floor was the complete opposite of Floor 5. It was full of noise and havoc as rushing doctors made their way to the right hallway and some made their way to the left. Screams were heard from multiple rooms, screams of agony.
Caroline and Toria ran down the left hallway where the most screams were heard from. They entered a room to see Toria's former patient, Deandre shaking and yelling, making an attempt to push away the doctors holding him down.
"Deandre! Calm down, it's me, Toria." Deandre stopped and took a look at her. For a moment, he seemed to have been perfectly fine until he started to let out a sound of pain and anger. Toria held him down with the other doctors. At first contact, she could feel the intensity of heat come from his body. "He's burning up! We need something to bring his fever down." She told Caroline. His screams turned into roars and growls as the seconds ticked on. Caroline searched around anxiously for something to help him, but stopped when she heard Toria's painful cries.
Deandre took out a chunk of flesh out of Toria's neck, chewing it furiously with his teeth. His skin charred, melting off of his body, blood poured out of his eyes and mouth while his eyes changed to the color of his blood. Warts bubbled up on the skin that hadn't melt off yet. Caroline watched in horror with doctors taking off from the room. He stared at Caroline, ready to charge at her until she ran out, slamming the glass door shut behind her, trapping the beast in the room with her friend who was bleeding out.
The hallways filled with patients running out of their room, only to attack the staff and people who hadn't turned into one of them. She shut herself in a closet, making sure to lock it. She could hear cries for help and things being broken all around her. All she did was sit in the small room and listen.
Caroline's phone rang, she answered it immediately after she realized it was her daughter who was calling her. "Honey, listen to me, stay at the school. Stay in a locked room. Keep yourself safe." She tried to speak over the noise.
"Mom, what's going on? Are you okay?" Her daughter spoke into the phone and she could hear the worry in her tone. Caroline cried quietly to herself as things seemed to get even worse outside of the room she hid herself in. "Mom?" Her daughter's desperate voice snapped her out of it.
"Something weird is going on. Find someplace safe to stay! Now!" Caroline screamed and hung up the phone, stuffing it into her pocket.
Caroline used her phone light to search for anything in the closet to be of assistance. She grabbed the wooden mop with an idea in mind. With both hands on the wooden handle, she slammed her foot down on the bottom part of the mop. She could hear the wood start to splinter and stomped on it a few more times until the mop broke off from the handle.
The noise started to simmer down from outside the door. Caroline didn't know whether that terrified her or not. It could mean one of two things: the zombie-like beings were dead or they killed all of the staff and now she was going to be a main target when she got out of this room.
She inched the door open slowly to where it wouldn't be loud. Down the hall she could see the glass door was broken from when she trapped one. Her friend, Toria was dragged out of the room with a blood trail following her body and feasted on by a few of them. Caroline eyed the door to the stairs, only a couple feet away.
With her grip on the wooden handle tightening, she ran for the door, yanking it open. She could hear a growl from behind her and she took off down the flight of stairs. She ran down quick enough to stay a good distance from the thing that wanted to rip her open and bite into her like a piece of food, and that's all she was to them, food.
Something squishy pelted her in the head, causing her to instinctively look up. At the top of the stairs was what used to be a human, missing ninety percent of it's flesh while the other pieces of skin looked like burnt meat with bubbles filled with puss surfacing on it. The skin that hit her in the head continued to droop like the cheese on a pizza down her hair. The zombie threw itself into the middle of the stair case, flying down at a fast pace until it caught itself onto the staircase railing where Caroline was standing near.
It lifted itself over the railing, standing a few feet away from her. She held onto her weapon as it charged at her. She swung the wooden handle at it, knocking it off of the staircase, only this time, it didn't catch itself. Caroline watched as the blood and fragments of the skull splattered everywhere.
She ran down the stairs, listening to the pleads for help from people trying to fend for themselves. A part of her felt guilty, wondering if she could help them, but her main priority was to get to her daughter. She reached the bottom floor where the parking garage was. The area was quiet, but that didn't fool her. Any one of the nasty creatures could have been waiting for someone to feed on. She didn't want to be someone's meal.
Loud thumps came up from behind her before she was push to the ground by a violent force. Her weapon knocked out of her hand, rolling off too far for her to grab. She flipped herself around to face whoever it was.
It was someone in a scrub's uniform, half of their face falling off while the other half looked perfectly fine. She could tell it was once a man. It lunged itself at her, quicker than she could process. Her hands held onto it's shoulders, pushing it's body away while it snapped it's teeth at her, attempting to gnaw at her flesh. Caroline realized just pushing it away wasn't doing anything so she dug her thumbs into the eye sockets of it. As the eyes popped out of their sockets, the beast let out a shriek. Blood started to fall out of the hole where it's eyes once were, splashing onto her face.
The blood spilling onto her face formed into puddle then streamed down to her lips. She spit the metallic tasting liquid out of her mouth and shoved the zombie off of her.
Caroline ran towards her weapon, grabbed it then spun around to slam it against the face of the thing that was coming at her. She beat it multiple times in the face until it stopped squirming and screeching. The blood and puss from bubbles formed on it's skin, hit her clothes as she continuously hit it even though she was certain it was dead.
She took a few steps back, staring at the mangled body from her beating until she went to find her car.
Caroline found her car, placing her only thing to use as a weapon in the passenger seat. She sped off to her daughter's school, hoping to take her away from all of the craziness she just had to deal with.
The phone in her pocket vibrated, signaling she had a voicemail. Something terrible struck her in the chest once she seen it was from her daughter. It was like the atmosphere changed around her, becoming gloomier.
Caroline held the phone to her ear, listening to the voicemail. "I don't know what's going on." She had to squish her ear into the phone to be able to make out what she was saying due to the loud thumps in the background. "Maybe whatever those things are out there have gotten to you too, who knows? I don't have much of a choice right now. Or time. I love you mom." Caroline cried as her daughter did too, listening to the heartbreaking message she had left for her. "I'm good as dead." Then the voicemail ended.
Caroline called her daughter back, but there was no answer. "Please, please pick up." She begged, trying to call her once more. Again, it was sent to voicemail. A hopeful part of her had thought that maybe she got out of the school and was now safe, but the logical side of her knew that her daughter was dead.
She pulled up to her daughter's school, grabbing a lighter she always kept in her cup holder and stuffing it in her pocket. As soon as she got out of the car, she headed to the back of car to open the trunk.
In the trunk was a five gallon metal gas can she always kept in case she ever ran out of gas. With both hands holding onto it, she crept inside the school. The hallways were quiet but she stayed alert and cautious to the surroundings. She began to pour gasoline around the hallways then in some of the classrooms. The school wasn't big, quite small for a high school and it made her on edge that any of the zombies could be lurking around the corners. The hallways were filled with the smell of gasoline and now with only a third of gas left in the gas can, she made her way to the gymnasium.
The doors were wide open, the darkness made her think twice about entering, but after a minute of convincing, she walked into the darkness of the room.
She splashed the contents all around the room as much as she could until the can was empty. She set the can down on the ground. Caroline's hand reached into her pocket for the lighter she brought with her.
With one flick, the flame came and disappeared. Caroline could hear growls start to surround her, but she didn't feel fear or terror. In the moment, she was calm. She tried the lighter again. This time, the flame stayed. She crouched down, hovering the flame above the gasoline filled floor until she let her flame get closer to the flammable liquid. She could feel the presence of evil all around her.
She was in a spot where the gas hadn't spread to yet.
The flames quickly erupted in the whole gymnasium, spreading into the hallways. Once the whole gym lit up like a Christmas tree, she could see the massive amount of zombies surrounding her. They each caught fire, letting out noises that nearly busted her eardrum.
There was a warmth she could feel sliding down from her ears and she knew it wasn't from the fire.
Caroline touched the liquid coming down from her ears. She had enough common sense to tell it was blood. She was infected and knew it.
A laugh came from her lips. "I'm not going to be one of you," She whispered, watching the fire destroy them. "I love you, Tara." Then she stepped into the fire, letting the flames engulf her body before the infection could take over and turn her into one of them.
Author's Note: I know you guys wanted a second part to Lockdown, so I hope this is good enough for you guys. Sorry if it's bad, but I hope you enjoy it!