The Dangerous Ones
By Mike Sims
.net
John and Mary are your typical young newlywed couple. All they want to do was vacation in various places, build a nest egg, and raise several kids. That year there was a severe outbreak of the flu. A strain that was much worse than any before. There was a flu vaccine and as fear spread, most people were taking the shot. The panic subsided and all seemed well in the world, John went to work and Mary took care of their new home. However, that evening the news said that something had gone wrong in regards to the flu virus. Some people were starting to have the virus affect them and had become murderous and mad. Mayhem took the streets as John and Mary could hear the screams of people being killed. John yells; "Mary throw cans of food into a bag quickly and I will get my gun, we need to leave town now!" Mary started crying; "what is going on John?" John grabbed her and held her close saying; "It will be alright, the military will sort this out. We just need to leave the danger of all these people." John looked into her eyes as she began to compose herself and nodded yes. John ran to his bedroom to unlock his gun safe and grab what he could. Mary frantically threw cans of food into grocery bags and everything they would need to eat not knowing when things would be normal. John runs into the garage and loads their car with a tent and tools. He yells; "Mary!" Mary comes running into the garage with sacks of food; "I have a few more!" She runs back in the house as the screams of people yelling and begging for help can be heard outside with gun shots. John loads up what he can and helps Mary with the last of the food items. They get in the car and John nervously puts the key in the ignition. "Okay, this is what is going to happen. I am going to start the car and then hit the garage button. We will quickly get the heck out of here and head to route 77 out of town." Mary nods her head yes gritting her teeth. John takes a deep breath as screams continue outside. He turns the car over and holds the brake down while putting the car into reverse. He puts his hand on the garage door opener; "here we go." Pushing the button the garage starts to open and the sunlight starts to illuminate the garage. The sounds of screaming and gunfire are more defined and louder now as the door comes up. John can see people running around and fighting in the streets of their subdivision. He lets go the brake and hits the gas pedal moving the vehicle backwards like a rocket. His neighbor steps out in the way of John's car as it rolls over the neighbor bouncing the car up and down on the new corpse. Mary screams; "Oh God, John!" John stops for a moment and says; "Fred." Then a shot hits side of his house as he sees a man with a gun aimed at him. At this point John is moving the car as fast as he can in reverse halfway down the drive way and then forward to run over the neighbor's lawns to avoid the jammed up street of dead bodies. Gun fire continues to pelt the vehicle as they make it out of the neighborhood dodging people and avoiding other cars. Eventually they make it to route 77 and they see cars tumbled over on the side of the roads and people begging for a ride but the traffic becomes more infrequent and even peaceful the further they leave town. Mary asks; "John what is going on?" John replies; "I don't know Mary. I think it has to do with the flu virus. It must be making people go mad." John turns the radio on and there is a news broadcast. The radio announcer says; "if you are trying to leave town, turn around and go back. There are people there trying to help you. The mad disease has been almost completely wiped out. The poor unfortunate souls that went mad have been all but stopped. Shelters are in place for those that need help or food." The message repeats itself till John turns it off. Mary asks; "how can we go back with that violence going on?" John; " we can't, it must not be cleared in our are yet. We will just camp out for a day or two till it is clear." They drive on to an area that John used to camp as a kid and knows it is isolated.
Reaching the destination John pitches his tent and Mary sorts out the food and supplies. They say few words as the events of the day have awestruck them. As they have organized everything, they bed in for the night hearing the sounds of animals and insects. Mary asks; "John." "yes Mary, " John replies. "are we going to be alright?" John; "you hear those insects and animals out there?" "yes," she replies. "that means nothing is out there. If someone comes around they will be quiet." Mary replies; "thank you for educating me." She lies quietly listening to those sounds as John does too but he maintains a brave front. They both drift off asleep as the cool night air comes over them. Mary suddenly wakes up from a nightmare stemming from the day's events. She realizes it is only a dream and sees that John is fast asleep. She lies down to sleep again but her eyes bounce open wide as she realizes there are no sounds outside the tent, neither an insect nor an animal, dead silence. She nudges John; he just mumbles and continues to sleep. "John," she whispers. John mumbles again, she hits him a little harder, and he wakes up, "what honey?" "No sounds outside," she says firmly yet quiet. John replies; "oh honey they don't always make a sound." They both lie there, as John's ears seem to beg for any sound to reassure them. He unzips his sleeping bag and grabs his pistol. Quietly he unzips the tent but it seems in a nervous situation the zipper sounds like a freight train rolling down breaking the silence. Mary looks nervous and ponders; "John." John slowly peeks his head out and looks around. The moonlight gives some definition to the outside. He sees nothing but then hears a slight sound of a twig breaking in front of him, but still nothing. Dead silence and not even a breeze blowing. John is knocked backwards by a man as Mary screams and the man makes his way into the tent in between the couple. The gun seems to have been dropped and disappears out of sight. John struggles and fights the man but he asks; "please don't hurt me." John replies; "who are you?" The man replies; "Zach, I am Zach. I am an accountant." John gets off Zach as Zach sits up in front of the tent and says; "I am so sorry. I was slipping away from others that were hunting me." John; "hunting you?" Mary sits up holding her face in her hands. John reaches over to comfort her. Zach; "I'm sorry, the world has gone nuts." John; "you know anything about this flu madness?" Zach; "yea it seems to start mostly downtown where I work. Everyone started going nuts and I barely made it out of there. I went home and my family was killed. Several men started questioning me and then shined some kind of blue light in my face and said; "he is not one of us." Then I ran, managed to get away from them and came out here. They have been on my tail ever since. Nevertheless, I lost them in the woods yesterday and was hiding out. I saw you people drive up and watched you. Realized you are just like me. I was startled when you popped out of your tent and thought the hunters were behind me." Day slowly starts to break as the blueish haze of morning creeps in. John; "well we need to get out of here." Zach; "I agree…" Suddenly Zach is pulled out of the tent as a man says; "there you are." Zach is shot as John and Mary yell and hold each other. A knife rips through the tent opening it up leaving the couple exposed in the view of three men. They are shaking as John says; "please don't hurt us." One of the men pulls out a flashlight and shines a blue light on them. The flashlight man looks at one of the others and says; "they are not us." The leader sits down and pulls a pistol out to aim it at their heads. John says; "I know you are infected with the mad virus but we are people, good people. You don't need to do this." The man points the gun down and says; "you don't understand. The virus was not the flu, but the flu shots. It mutated and you obviously got it. That is what the light tells us. We have to kill you otherwise you will become zombie like and start eating anything alive." John and Mary looked puzzled as John says; "what?" The man continues; "you are the infected ones not us. I'm sorry; you look like nice folks too." The man points the gun as Mary says; "John!" John; "the police or the military will be here and will come after you guys." The man says; "we are the military." Mary cries and then silent as her head rests on John's shoulder. John looks over at Mary to comfort her and lifts her head up but her eyes have turned purple color and she bites John as he screams out. Suddenly a gunshot rings out from the man as he stops her attack. John looks at his lifeless wife crying and looks up at the man pointing the gun at him now." The man; "told you." Boom a sound rings out from the pistol. The three men standing over the bodies of John and Mary compose themselves. The leader lights a cigar; "gentlemen, we have work to do." They leave to continue the clean up as their commander reports that they have ninety percent containment now.
The End?