Transformation Read online

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  It took Ana a while to get Lisa to the rooftop and to the little building that provided access to the top of the elevator shafts. On the roof the moon provided enough light for her to see three figures skulking towards her from the rear of the structure.

  Ana heard the men shouting just as she reached the door. She tugged and it didn’t budge. She almost fainted she was so scared. She pulled again harder and it opened. Whatever Jeff had wedged into the door to keep it unlocked also made it hard to open. She shoved Lisa inside and turned to pull the door shut. It stopped a few inches from closing. She pulled at it in panic. She heard a loud voice right outside the door.

  “I did it! I got my foot in the door!”

  Ana opened the door, startling the chubby man standing near it. She immediately rushed him, hitting the man in the chest with both forearms and drove him backwards and on his ass.

  Lisa watched in horror as Ana flew out the door. She saw the door shut, heard the thump as it hit the frame and the click of the latch. She was safe but Ana was not.

  Lisa made her way to the door as quickly as she could in the complete darkness and found the knob. She hesitated. She wasn’t sure what she could do to help Ana. She lowered her hand from the knob, her throat tight with emotion. She hated herself for being so fat.

  So disgustingly morbidly obese and fat. She started to weep for Ana and hated herself more each second. She stood in the darkness unable to help her.

  I’m worthless. Totally fucking worthless.

  Shaking with fear and grief she put her hand back on the knob lightly, but took it away. She put her face in her hands and sobbed.

  35.

  Cooper and Rachael were dropped off north of Morgan Hill on the 101. Still well south of San Jose and the airport. They walked down the center of the northbound lanes. He’d been here only days before but it felt like a lifetime ago. They walked slowly, keeping a sharp eye out for the dead and looking back every so often to make sure nothing was following them.

  Cooper immediately started explaining his conversation with Trevor before another distraction prevented it. Rachael listened.

  “So are you asking me to help?” she asked nonchalantly.

  “No, just letting you know what I’m up to. Why I need to get there so quickly.”

  “So you aren’t asking for my help? She looked at him as she walked on, thumbs hooked under the straps of her backpack.

  “Like I’m not useful to you. Is it because I’m a girl? You think I am worthless because I don’t have a penis? What the fuck?”

  Cooper was stunned, felt bad, confused, and was a little scared at the crazy outburst. He turned to her and she was smiling. She started to laugh.

  “You are too easy.”

  “Cooper smiled and muttered to himself. “Barrel of fun.”

  She smiled, pleased with herself. Cooper smiled too. He loved a good sense of humor. His face went flat as the present reality soaked back in and his voice reflected it.

  “Of course, you can come along.” He said “I’d welcome the help and the company.”

  “Thanks. Sorry if I was messing around at a bad time. I know what you are talking about is serious.”

  “Nah, it’s good. I appreciate the laughs.”

  They both fell deep in thought as they walked on. Cooper never ceased his vigilant search of the surrounding area for any possible threat.

  “This is exhausting.” Rachael said after about an hour of walking.

  “Yeah.” Cooper spoke low.

  “Ever since all this stuff happened, I’ve been hanging in one place. You’ve walked all over huh? I’m not used to all this walking.”

  “Yeah.” Cooper looked annoyed at her.

  “Everything OK?” She looked confused at his expression.

  “Just trying to keep super quiet.”

  “Why?” She looked about in alarm but saw nothing nearby.

  Cooper slowed a bit. It hadn’t occurred to him that Rachael had far less experience with the dead than he did.

  “Have you noticed all the corpses on the sides of the highway? Look between the buildings there and there.” He pointed. “They are attracted to living humans. Sight, sound, smell, it all seems to trigger them.”

  “They can hear us? This far away?” She whispered.

  “Not sure but they seem able to detect a human from a good distance, and I don’t know if it’s sight, smell, sound, all three.”

  Rachael looked around, more vigilant than ever.

  They walked a bit farther in silence. She whispered when she next spoke.

  “I think I need a rest.”

  Cooper was tired too. “Let’s go up there for a bit.”

  They walked off the 101 and to an intersection. Cooper chose an uphill location as he knew it was likely clear of the dead. To their right was a big parking lot and beyond that a mall. Cooper was pointing at the closest roof which was over a large transit stop.

  He boosted Rachael up to the roof. They sipped water and chilled for a bit.

  “I never want to get down from here,” she said.

  “I know what you mean. You know you can’t stay up here forever, but you feel safe up here. It’s hard to want to jump back down there.”

  “It’s like the game we played when we were kids. At least I did.” She laid back on the roof.

  “Yeah, I think about that game a lot, especially lately with all the roof climbing. It’s like jumping from table to chair to sofa—you can’t touch the ground.”

  “Yeah, it’s lava.”

  Cooper laughed. “I wonder where that came from, that idea for a game.”

  “For me it was the fear of monsters under my bed.”

  “Yeah I was afraid of Gollum. The Lord of the Rings came out when I was like five or six.”

  “I don’t know what I was afraid of. I mean, I didn’t have a picture in my head or anything. I just didn’t like the idea there was that dark space between the floor and the bed.”

  “Well, time to jump off the bed and onto the floor. We need to get a little farther today.” Cooper slid to the edge of the roof.

  “Wait. I need to tell you something. It’s eating at me.”

  “What?” Cooper leaned back, a million terrible things running through his mind. What is she going to tell me?

  She looked him the eyes and her face melted into tears. She was sobbing. “I saw him. I saw Ben in the car.”

  “Oh.”

  “He was trapped, fighting to get out as we drove by.”

  “Well, we both know how bad he is.” Cooper pat her nearest shoulder a couple of times and gave her a thin smile.

  She continued to sob. “Yeah, he was evil. I watched him murder innocent people, kids that were no threat to him. But what does that make me? That I let you drive by without a word.”

  “I know it’s a lot to deal with. But never forget what he did, what he will most likely do now that he’s alive.”

  She just nodded her head, she leaned against Cooper for comfort.

  “Don’t get the wrong idea,” she said.

  “Understood,” Cooper said.

  They were silent for a few minutes.

  “We better go.” Rachael started down.

  Cooper went over the edge, hung and dropped the last few feet. He helped her down. They saw a few of the dead coming at a distance and moved on and away from them.

  “If it helps any, remember he’s still alive.”

  “I still made the decision to let him die. Worse still, I did it with a smile on my face and my middle finger up.”

  “Wow.”

  “You think I’m an asshole.”

  “No, but . . . wow.” He was suppressing a laugh. “That’s . . . I don’t know the word for it. I mean he deserved it so maybe apropos?”

  She shook her head. “Who speaks like that? Apropos? Give me a break.”

  “I thought the word apropos was apropos.”

  “Wow, twice in one sentence. That is very un-apropo
s if you ask me.”

  Cooper chuckled then changed the subject. “We should get a vehicle.”

  “That would be very apropos right now,” she said.

  They found a car and the drive was quick and smooth all the way to the structure. Cooper went on the elevated expressways as often as possible, but eventually he would have to drive down to get to the structure.

  “It’s so weird.” Cooper was driving when a deep sense of sadness came over him. “In the world today, it can take days to travel a short distance because of all the crap, or you can zoom along unhindered. And as much as I hate being down there in the crap, it feels worse when things are easy and you have time to think.”

  “I was thinking about Homeland.”

  “The agency or the show?”

  “The show. It sounds stupid but all this shit happened before the end of the season. Now I’ll never know what happened.”

  “Big television watcher?” Cooper raised an eyebrow.

  “No, but when I like a show I record it. When I like a show, it’s an escape I really look forward to. Now I don’t have that.”

  “I wonder what the actress is doing. I wonder if she got infected or if she’s scratching along like we are.”

  “I’d still ask for her autograph.” Rachael smiled. “I try to tell myself it’s just like having a show cancelled. I can deal with it, but it’s not. We’ll never get to do or experience so many things now.”

  “But we can try. You will love the garage. We’ve made it pretty comfortable to live in.”

  Cooper slowed as he came closer to the structure. He stopped the car and walked to the edge of the expressway. Rachael followed. Cooper pulled out his scope and popped the lens covers off and raised it to his eye.

  He didn’t know what to make of what he was seeing. It took him a while to figure out what he was even looking at. He lowered the scope and looked at Rachael.

  “What? What is it?”

  “Another delay. A big one.”

  36.

  The sun was high enough in the sky that it warmed Ron and Weed through the branches of the fir trees. They’d been walking for hours in a huge arc around a large hill. Once they scaled it, they would have a view of the vast weed farm in the valley below. Or so Weed assumed.

  The warmth of the sun did much to help the two keep going, but it was still very rough going.

  Weed stopped to wipe his forehead and looked back. Ron was a good forty feet behind and moving slow.

  “Come on grandpa.” he laughed.

  Ron halfheartedly swung one arm up with an extended middle finger.

  “You even shoot the bird like an old man.”

  Ron came to rest next to Francis and leaned on a tree. An odd noise rumbled in the silence. Ron’s head shot up.

  Weed’s eyebrows were high on his forehead.

  “Was that a fart?” Ron asked.

  “My stomach.”

  “I think you farted.”

  “If I did, you would know it. Believe me,” Weed chuckled.

  “How can you be so happy?” Ron asked.

  “I ain’t happy. I’m god-awful fucking miserable. Just trying to get through this is all.”

  It occurred to Ron the man has probably been through this type of thing many times already. It also occurred to him he was so beat partially because he had no strong motivation to keep going.

  Weed looked uphill and pointed.

  “Now we have to climb that shit.” He extended his elbow to Ron. “Take my arm grandpa, I’ll help you up the little hill.”

  Ron rolled his eyes. “No you first. Age before beauty and all that.”

  Weed smiled and winked. “Bad choice there, Ronnie.” He turned and started uphill.

  Ron looked confused at the foreboding comment until the smell hit him.

  “Oh Jesus! What the…”

  “I told you you’d know!” And Francis guffawed loudly.

  The hill was brutal. Both men were so hungry now they had to do something about it to keep going.

  Weed stopped and put a hand on a tree to lean. “I’m no outdoorsman, but there’s got to be something we can eat. I’m starving my old grey balls off.”

  “Me too, although your visual has helped reduce my appetite a bit.”

  Weed looked around. “I ain’t got nothing. You?”

  Ron shook his head. “How far are we from the compound?”

  “I have no idea.”

  “I’m so hungry, I would go back in there to get something to eat.”

  “Yeah, I’m with ya’ on that brother. Let’s tackle the hill and see where we are.”

  Ron just nodded and started walking. The hill they were climbing was at least eight hundred feet high.

  Noon. The sun was straight overhead. Ron and Weed were resting about halfway up. The rough terrain and their weakened condition made the going hard and slow. Every ten minutes or so one of the men would stop and just stand, the other would follow suit. Few words were exchanged and usually it was Weed and that was only to mumble a harsh expletive or curse some part of his body. The climb started with the milder comments.

  “Damn, feet hurting like shit!”

  The more potent, although more subdued.

  “Fucking beard feels like a boiled dog on my face.”

  Ron cracked a smile at every comment. The longer they walked, the more venomous Old Francis would become and Ron would be more amused as a result. He noticed that although he was weak and struggling, he actually felt a greater sense of energy and motivation within himself. He realized he was starting to think of Francis as a friend, a fellow member of a group that needed him. He wondered how he would feel when this was all over—if they made it out alive.

  Finally Old Francis let loose his longest diatribe yet.

  “Shit eating old fucking carcass dragging my shit up the fucking shit damn shit.”

  Ron had to laugh out loud at that last one. In addition to all his other ailments, the painful blisters on his feet was cause to do a little more than stand still for a few minutes. Laughing sapped his last reserves of energy.

  “That last one did me in.” Ron fell to his knees. He was happy in spirit and thoroughly miserable in body. He’d never been in such a challenging situation and finally understood how it was that Old Francis went to humor to get through tough times. With a buoyed spirit, he felt he could keep going no matter what until he dropped dead.

  Francis went to his knees and then on his side. “Last what?”

  Ron was on his back now. “That last…” Ron circled his finger in the air as the words evaded him. “That last cursing of one of your body parts.”

  Francis closed his eyes and smiled. He could think of a few replies but he never quite got around to spitting anyone of them out.

  Weed woke first. The sun was low in the sky, and the wind was picking up, it was getting cold. He felt better and worse in several ways. He rolled to his stomach and pushed himself up to his knees and got to his feet. The old fart routine is for real this time.

  He was only a few feet from Ron who was splayed out on his back sound asleep. Weed gathered up some wood and dropped to his knees behind a large rock. He lowered the wood to the ground quietly. Soon he had a crackling, popping blaze going on.

  As the sun dropped and the wind picked up, it got cold. Ron woke shivering in near complete darkness. The stars were dots of brilliance above him. Firelight drew his eye and wood smoke filled his nostrils. He saw the old man sitting by the fire, his face danced behind wild hair and beard. He was sitting with shoes off and staring into the flames.

  Ron shuffled into the circle of light and warmth.

  “Hey.” Ron felt he could go back to sleep.

  Weed grunted.

  “Nice spot. Thanks for getting this going.”

  Francis just stared into the flames and nodded.

  They sat by the fire wishing they were somewhere, anywhere, else in the world. But they were here by choice and didn’t feel afraid. They weren’t
captives or victims. They were men on a mission. For the rest of the night, the two men sat in complete silence, keeping the fire going, keeping a lookout, occasionally sleeping. By morning they were ready to move on. They were past hunger, past fear, and into a state of numbness where keeping going was easy. By early morning they were atop the hill and looking down.

  “That’s it?” Ron squinted as he looked into the valley.

  “Yup. We need to load up what we can and take off.”

  “All we have to do is avoid the booby-traps and armed Nazis,” Ron said deadpan.

  “Yeah,” Weed sighed. “That’s all.”

  The downhill trip was much quicker and easier than the uphill climb. Both men were exhausted and lost their footing several times. One would fall and the other would help him to his feet and continued on without a word. The steep hillside dropped them rapidly into the valley.

  Ron stopped at the last of the drops to the valley floor and Weed sidled up next to him. Before them were hundreds, maybe thousands, of marijuana plants. The border between natural vegetation and cultivated plants was clear. They walked the last few yards to the very edge of forest and stopped.

  Weeds voice was gruff as it rattled from his parched throat.

  “Fuck it. Let’s go back.”

  Ron smiled. That was so horrible an idea it was funny.

  “I kind of miss my old room at the Hitler Hilton.” Ron started forward and with that they were amongst the plants and creeping carefully along.

  Weed was surrounded by green gold. This was his garden of Eden, a personalized heaven, but he wasn’t feeling it. He had a job to do.

  “I’m not seeing any tripwires or anything suspicious.” Ron squinted, his eyes shifting left to right.

  Weed pulled all his hair back over his head with one hand and wiped his forehead with his sleeve.

  “Yeah, I think we are entering the valley from the park side and the traps were probably setup mostly on the front end near the roads. Anyway, I’m too fucking beat to do much more than drag my ass through these plants. Speaking of which.”

  Weed dropped to the ground on his hands and knees and rifled through the fallen plants. “Oh dear lord, they’re dry.” He was all smiles as he rolled a giant wad of dried leaves into a paperless joint and lit it.