It was shortly after eleven A.M. Despite eating a light breakfast of cereal and milk, Tim was ravenous again. When the TV was first brought in, the first thing Tim turned on was the local news. So far nothing bearing any relationship to dead people rising out of the ground was being reported but that had quickly changed when WLAN, the local CNN affiliate, broke in on the breaking story.
Tim had watched spellbound. Part of him still couldn’t believe what was happening, while another part of him was growing increasingly worried about Chelsea and his parents. Mom and Dad had left Brendan Hall shortly before ten o’clock, telling him they were going home to gather some paperwork, then they were going to the courthouse to secure the dismissal of the charges and his release. They were due back any minute. Officer Clapton was supposed to give him an update on Chelsea and he hadn’t heard anything since then. In the meantime, corpses were pulling themselves out of their graves, attacking people, biting them (but not eating them, Tim observed…they’re not eating people, just attacking them), and, as a result, there were over two dozen people missing. It wouldn’t be long before the national press picked up on the story. Tim had flipped around to CNN and Fox but so far they weren’t reporting on the phenomenon. Yet.
Every time an officer came near the holding cell, Tim changed the channel to something innocuous. The Cooking Channel, the History Channel, Cartoon Network. He asked to use a phone. He wanted to call his mom on her cell phone, find out what was going on. Each time he asked this, his request was denied. When he asked why, no response was given.
Officer Clapton paid one final visit that morning. He’d told Tim that he’d spoken to his mother on the phone and they’d been heading home to pick up a few things, then they were heading back to Lancaster for their meeting with the DA, who would formally file the paperwork to have the charges dismissed. Once again, Tim asked to use a phone so he could call them. And once again, his request was denied. It was then that Officer Clapton noticed the television (at this point turned off), in the holding cell.
“How’d that get in here?” Officer Clapton asked.
“I asked for it,” Tim said.
Officer Clapton didn’t say anything. He left and Tim turned the TV back on. When he was sure Clapton wasn’t in the near vicinity, he switched over to CNN.
What he saw stunned him. The rising dead of Spring Valley was now national news.
Soledad O’Brien was reporting on the local current events with something like disbelief. “…the locals are adamant in saying that the attackers are dead. We go to our local affiliate WLAN for more.”
Tim watched, stunned, heart racing, as one of the local talking heads reported from what appeared to be downtown Spring Valley. “Soledad, the events that are transpiring in this small Pennsylvania town in the heart of Amish Country can only be described as unbelievable. When Spring Valley police responded to a frantic 911 call earlier this morning, they found a deserted neighborhood with disturbing signs of foul play. It wasn’t until the State Police were called in that things took a turn for the macabre.”
The footage switched to a pre-recorded interview with a man in a smartly dressed shirt and tie. The caption on the screen identified him as Reverend Burns, of the Brethren Church of Spring Valley. Through a combination of the local newscaster and interviews with Reverend Burns, Tim learned that most of the occupants of the good Reverend’s churchyard had clawed their way up and skedaddled. “Some of them were little more than bones dressed in the clothes they were buried in,” Reverend Burns said. He looked like the survivor of a plane crash; his eyes were haunted, shocked.
Tim turned the volume low, listening in growing shock and fear as the newscaster related that there were reports of the dead attacking the living, killing them, only to have the victims immediately rise and shamble off to join the legions of the dead. One of the witnesses, a guy Tim recognized as the owner of the deli on Main Street, related rather calmly that he watched, from his apartment window, a gaggle of zombies pounce on the mailman and tear him to pieces. “He wasn’t dead for long,” the man said. “As soon as they killed him, they left. They didn’t eat him like you see in the movies. They just wandered off down the street, and a moment later the dead guy got up and sort of stumbled off in a different direction.”
“And you’re sure he was dead?” the reporter asked.
“Oh yeah. He was torn the hell up. His jugular was severed, you could tell when one of those things bit into his neck. I’ve never seen so much blood.”
There was a switch back to CNN headquarters in Atlanta. Soledad O’Brien looked grim. “I’m just getting word that the National Guard has been called in by the Governor. We will, of course, stay on top of this story — “
The door to the room opened and Officer Clapton stood there as two officers stormed in. They turned the television off, unplugged it, and began wheeling it out of the room. Tim’s protests to keep it fell on deaf ears.
And now he had no idea what was happening.
They’d removed the TV fifteen minutes ago. He could tell things were getting worse by the voices outside his holding cell. Twice Tim pounded on the locked door, demanding to know what was happening. Officer Clapton stopped by and told him it was best that he stay put. “What about my parents!” Tim yelled back.
“When they come back they won’t be allowed to leave until the situations in Spring Valley and Lititz are under control,” Officer Clapton said.
“But what about — “
“Your folks called and told me they were making a pit stop at the house for something, then they’re coming to get you. Don’t worry, Tim, you’re safe here.”
If he could only believe that.
Chapter Twenty-Four
The guesthouse smelled like an oven that had been cooking a spoiled dead pig, but Tom told Harry and Victor to shut the hell up about it and get to work painting. Victor muttered that he wasn’t the one that had killed that couple and Tom almost exploded. He’d said, “You raped that girl and you withheld and helped bury evidence. That makes you just as guilty. You’re an accessory. If I get pinned for anything, you guys are going down with me. Got it?”
That had shut Victor up, and the three of them worked at painting over the blood-stained floor. Tom had to drag the garden hose in from the yard and wash away the bulk of the blood and meat that littered the guesthouse. They didn’t even have time to let the floor dry; they just started painting over it. If the shit hit the fan, extracting a DNA sample would still be possible, but if he could contaminate the scene as much as possible…
“We can apply another coat after this one has dried,” Tom said. Harry and Victor nodded, working silently.
Tom made sure Harry and Victor were working at covering the obvious crime scene. He assisted by applying a coat of paint in the living room near the door so he could keep a watch toward the front of the house. Scott and his friends were in the basement dismembering the bodies and feeding the pieces to the fireplace. Scott had given the boys brief instructions, had shown them his basement workroom with all its tools (including a power saw), and then left them to their task while he went to tackle his own. He’d left Scott with one final admonition: “Don’t worry, we’ll get through this.” Scott had nodded, and Tom had a feeling his son was handling this pretty well. He was a tough kid.
Tom was lost in his thoughts on what the next step should be when Harry broke the silence. “Like father, like son.”
Tom stopped and turned to Harry. “Excuse me?”