Carol was looking out of the windshield straining her big blue eyes a little, ever vigilant, a shotgun resting between her legs. Viktor stole a glance and was mentally assessing the differences between his deceased fiancée and Carol; very different was his conclusion, as always. It always confused him how he could be attracted to two completely diverse personalities; or did the end of the world not give him much choice? He shook his head subconsciously, that wasn’t it, there was something definitely. If nothing, finding her had given him some purpose after all.

He allowed himself a brief smile before remembering how both their worlds had ended the same day, how they had lost the ones they loved the most. Viktor’s thoughts started drifting back to the beginning of it all or rather the end, he could never decide how to phrase that.

-------x---------x----------x--------x----------x---------x----------x--------x----------x---------x----------x--------x------

December 23, 2012                                                       

01.30 pm

“Are you sure kid? This is a huge risk you’re taking.” The woman sighed. She wasn’t unattractive but she had an ability to be plain and blend in so well anywhere that no one would give her a second look.  

“Look, it’s true that only the two of us know you faked your death last month but if anyone else finds out, you’ll be dead for real.” The woman was almost whispering at the café table they shared with concern in her voice. She had run him in the “blackest of black ops” for seven years after all.

“I’m sure, Cruz. I need to get out and I need to do it now, delaying will only make things more complicated for you and me and everyone around us.” Viktor huddled closer to the table and said in a lower voice, “Besides that mission was so successful that the loss of one asset won’t be much of a problem, you might still get another secret medal.” Viktor sat back with a mischievous look on his face. Though he still didn’t know her first name for sure, he had always shared a good relationship with Cruz.

“It’s a girl, isn’t it?” She put a crooked index finger to her temple as if she was in deep thought. “That brunette from the school assignment, if I’m not mistaken.” She said with a cheeky smirk of her own.

Viktor stood up smiling leaving the money for food and a little tip on the table, “Thanks for watching my back always. Don’t miss me too much.” He stuck his hand out. “Merry Christmas.”

Cruz got up smiling as well and shook his hands. “I like the new look, short hair suits you and back to your natural black as well.” They shared a laugh. “Lay low for a bit, don’t do anything stupid; you know the drill. Don’t make me ID your body. Good luck kid.”

They walked out of the diner and away in opposite directions.

*************************************************************************************

07.30 pm

Viktor King was scared, plain and simple. A year ago he could never have imagined doing anything remotely like this, this was Viktor doing the impossible. The man could take out an entire army unit with just a needle but he was almost shivering and the breeze on the balcony had nothing to do with it.  

Forgetting the speech he had rehearsed thrice in front of the mirror he went down on one knee, looked up at her and asked, “Maddy, will you marry me?”

The hyper brunette looked into his eyes, clearly stunned. For once in her life Madeleine Cross was lost for words, speechless might have been an understatement. All their friends who had come to celebrate her birthday were holding their collective breaths with anticipation as if daring each other to let it out.

Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, she nodded crying, struggling to even get a ‘yes’ across to him. They kissed with a beautiful meteor shower in the background.

A raucous cheer, rounds of congratulations and champagne followed. Madeleine couldn’t have asked for a better birthday present.

*************************************************************************************

December 25, 2012

01.00 am

As per Madeleine’s request, the engaged couple were having a late dinner dressed like a couple for marriage. Viktor was in a crisp black suit and Madeleine was wearing a rather pretty white dress.

“Do we have to be dressed up for a dinner at home?” Viktor was complaining.

“Stop complaining Viktor, it’s not the end of the world if you wear a suit at home.” She retorted laughing.

“But still…”

Madeleine just gave him the look and that was enough to keep Viktor quiet.

They were joking and teasing at the table when Madeleine collapsed in between the meal and started bleeding from her mouth and nose.

Viktor rushed her to the hospital only to find the hospital in complete disarray; the doctors, nurses and orderlies were running around hurriedly. He tried to call for help and no one was even looking in his direction. He approached the reception with Madeleine in his arms.

“Excuse me, my fiancée collaps-“

The tall blonde lady in the counter held up a finger while speaking to someone else.

He tried again but she held up the same finger.

“Listen lady, my fiancée is dying, I need some frikkin help here!” He shouted at her finally.

She just stared at him. “Collapsed and started bleeding, right? Every case we received in the last three hours is the same. Someone will get to you. It’s Christmas Eve, we’re short of staff. Have a little patience sir.”

Viktor was losing his patience and his sanity, “Here’s the thing-if someone doesn’t look at her right now, you’ll be one more staff short.” He said that even before he could process that he shouldn’t have.

“Are you threatening me? I’ll have you arrested.” She pointed a finger at him.

Viktor was beginning to think that he really needed to break that finger but instead he changed tact, “Just help me please. I’ll gladly go to jail after. Please.”

She shook her head and sighed, she had seen too many people like that. Human emotions were raw at times like this and she couldn’t blame him. And the man did remind her of her brother in the Army.

She pointed at the farthest corridor, “go to the last room. It’s labeled ‘Supplies’ but there’s a bed in there. Just wait there, I’ll send someone around.”

“Thank you. Thank you so much.” He could have cried, “I’m sorry, I-“

“Just go.”

Viktor carried Madeleine to the room, which was a good five minutes away in an otherwise empty corridor, and placed her gently on the bed. She hadn’t woken up after her collapse and her pulse was so faint that he doubted it was there.

A doctor and a nurse came in after a few minutes, the nurse kicked him out. Exactly one minute later they exited the room looking somber. The doctor looked crestfallen, “I’m sorry, there wasn’t anything we could do. She is…gone.”

Viktor looked at the doctor for a few moments and then said, “No. It can’t be, she had a pulse. She can’t be gone, no way.” He caught the doctor’s coat and started shaking him, “Check again! I’m sure she’s alive. Go! Check!”

The nurse laid a hand on his shoulder and when he looked into her teary eyes he knew it was done. He let the doctor go. They said their condolences and hurried away to attend to others.

Viktor was sitting outside the room on the floor with his head in his hands and silent tears running down his face when he heard screams and shouts from the other end of the corridor.

When he raised his head to listen clearly, he could hear the fear and noises all around him so much so that the panic and dread he heard were tangible and chilled him to the bone. A man like Viktor knew that wasn’t good news. He solved his internal dilemma whether to leave Madeleine’s body or investigate the noises and stood up to check it.

As he was rubbing his eyes and starting to walk, he saw a bearded man in a trench coat clutching his shoulder and running awkwardly towards him shouting, “Goddamnit! Shit! Goddamn zombies!”

The man continued his awkward gait throughout the length of the corridor and landed at Viktor’s feet, scared, disoriented and breathing hard. Viktor bent down and helped the man sit up against the wall noticing that he was bleeding from his neck and shoulder and had good chunks of flesh bitten out of his right thigh and arm.

“Shit man. What the hell happened?”

“Zombies!”

Normally Viktor would have told him to stop smoking whatever he was and get a life. But the tone of his voice and the genuine fear in his eyes compelled Viktor to give the man the benefit of the doubt.

‘The body can try to lie, but the eyes never lie.’ His mentor’s words were coming back to him.

“Does that thing work?” Viktor asked him, pointing at the holstered gun under the man’s armpit.

“Yeah.” The man briefly studied him, “you know how to use it?”

“I wouldn’t ask if I didn’t.”

The man contemplated handing over his weapon to a complete stranger but after a few seconds deliberation regarded it safe enough and handed it over. Viktor felt the reassuring weight of the gun in his hand and checked it out of habit.

He turned to the man, “Stay put. Let me go have a look around, OK?”

The man nodded in return.

He didn’t have to move though. From the end the man had come through, he witnessed the blonde receptionist looking over her shoulder and trying to run towards them. What happened next remained in Viktor’s memory forever, not by choice. The earlier chill he felt was warmth compared to the horror he would see next.

Three people were chasing her and pulled her down drowning the woman’s screams with their own inhuman shrieks. The lady went quiet after a few seconds and the two men sincerely hoped she was dead by then; she surely did not deserve what was happening to her. The three people were biting, clawing and literally tearing her apart with their bare hands.

As if by instinct one of the three looked up at Viktor and the man, it was a woman unlike any either had seen; her eyes were blood red matching the blood running down her mouth and shirt and she had a malicious grin on her face. She made an inhuman noise, a combination of a grunt and a moan, attracting the attention of the other two who were male. Without warning they started slowly moving towards them.

“Shit! Shit! Shit! Shoot them man! Just shoot them!” The man was hysterical.

Viktor did not need to be told twice, he raised the gun and squeezed the trigger thrice. The third bullet piercing the head of the third assailant before the first body hit the floor.

“Damn! Three headshots from here?” The man looked at Viktor in amazement still breathing hard. He clearly didn’t have much time left.

Viktor was silent for a second, joining some dots in his head. “OK. Here’s what I think. I think you know what’s happening. So just frikkin spill it. Who are you? What the hell was all that?” Viktor asked pointing at the bodies.

The man took a deep breath. It hurt him. “My name is Peter Williams. I think under the circumstance I can tell you what department I work for. I’m with the –“

They were interrupted by the sound of light footsteps from behind them.

“Maddy!” Exclaimed a visibly surprised Viktor. She looked at Viktor and he saw the last vestige of hope disappear with her eyes. The kind, warm eyes of the school teacher replaced by the same blood red eyes of the woman he had just shot. She shrieked and tried to grab at Viktor who kept deflecting her attempts and dancing around finally pushing her in the direction of the dead bodies. Madeleine tripped and fell over the bodies but soon began picking herself up again.

“Whatever she meant to you, she is no more. She’s just a shell for that bloodthirsty thing now; it’ll be a mercy to finish it for her.” Peter said softly as if he was scared that undead Madeleine would notice him too. Or he was afraid of Viktor who was better than him with his own weapon. Or both.

Viktor did not respond, he just gripped the gun tighter. Madeleine lunged at him and in that same second he raised the gun and fired a single shot. Like in the countless movies he had seen and books he had read, time seemed to slow down for him. He could see the path of the bullet as it exited the gun and moved towards Madeleine in slow motion, ending by creating a bloody red eye in her forehead. She fell down dead, finally, taking a part of Viktor’s soul with her.

“Nothing else you could have done. I am sorry.” The dying man was having more than a little difficulty speaking. “You need to get out of here. Hospital’s not safe. You have to go.” This time there was no fear in his voice, only a resignation that he was indeed dying and did not have much time left.

Viktor had tuned out Peter, he walked up to Madeleine’s corpse and stood over it before finally collapsing to his knees and felt fresh tears flow down his face. He did not wipe them away, felt no shame knowing another man was present, he just cried.

He came back to his senses hearing wheezing noises from behind him and turned around to see Peter lying on his side, pale and gasping for breath.

“Shit man. Peter. Hang on.” He tried to help him sit up again gently.

 “It’s OK. I’m not gonna make it, I know that,” he smiled a bloody smile.

“What is all this Peter?” He wiped his eyes and face on his coat sleeve. “I know you have some answers.”

“It’s not just here. It’s all around the world,” he rasped. Taking another painful deep breath he continued, “Some sort of bio-weapon has been released. Sector 9 believes it to be a new kind of pathogen that was engineered to kill the human brain but it mutated and now it ‘rewires’ the brain by somehow ‘rebooting’ the mind and body by almost killing the host; like how you restart a computer after installing a new program except this one completely deletes your brain and gives it a new OS making the person an aggressive, mindless killer. Two of us were sent here to investigate the happenings here.” He managed to say this in a rush before his tone turned sad, “Harry didn’t make it.”

“Sector 9,” Viktor said softly, “so it’s real. Who would attack the WORLD with a bio-weapon?  Why? There’s more, right Peter?” Viktor tried to speak as kindly as he could under the circumstances.

Peter ignored the questions. “Thankfully though, we don’t think it is contagious. But you have to leave this place. Take the gun, spare magazine in my coat pocket, and head for the police station. I think you can hole up in there till help arrives.” He coughed blood all over his hand and took a big gulp of air, “Take care…friend. Stay...alive”

He attempted another weak smile and breathed his last, dying in Viktor’s arms. Viktor stared for a moment before carefully laying him on the floor and drawing his eyes to close. He checked the dead man’s pockets and came up with some cash, a plain black card with a magnetic strip and the magazine but no ID or papers. He knew nothing save Peter’s name but felt pain for the man’s death anyway, something his training had taken away.

He pocketed the items and walked around towards Madeleine’s corpse again, bent down and brushed a strand of hair away from her face and whispered, “I love you Maddy. I always will.”

-------x---------x----------x--------x----------x---------x----------x--------x----------x---------x----------x--------x------

“VIKTOR!”

Viktor broke out of his reverie but he was too late to avoid hitting a person that had stumbled on to their path. The vehicle crashed into the woman and ran over her with only the slightest of extra effort. Viktor stopped and looked through the rear view mirror to find the person face down and trying to move as if in pain. It was a woman in a dirty white dress. Without thinking, he got out of the vehicle and started walking towards her.

“Are you OK? Are you hurt? Hello?” He kept repeating it to her.

Carol was more vigilant while leaving the vehicle, training the shotgun on the fallen form and with her ears alert to any sudden sounds.

As Viktor got to within a few feet of the person with his hand outstretched she looked up and shrieked at him. Viktor jumped back as she tried to get up and catch him. Carol was quicker and shot the woman thrice making sure she wouldn’t get up again. Viktor just stood there staring at the fallen form.

“Come on Viktor, time to go.”

“Yeah. Let’s umm...go.”

They got back into the vehicle and Viktor slammed his door harder than necessary. “Stupid, stupid, stupid me! Could have gotten us both killed.” He slammed his hand on the steering wheel. “That was such a frikkin’ stupid thing to do.” He continued swearing at himself. Carol tried to hide her amusement and let him go on for a few minutes; the man needed an outlet after all.

“Right,” she finally said, “stupid Viktor. Now, let’s get out of here or it will be dead Viktor and dead Viktor will be worse.” She tried not to sound too motherly but couldn’t help the scolding tone that escaped.

“I’m sorry Carol. That was...”

“Stupid.” She finished it for him with barely concealed twinkle in her eyes.

“Yeah.” He scratched the back of his head grinning sheepishly, “Next time, just shoot me.”

“Roger that.” She chambered a round for effect, the only question on Viktor’s mind then was how many bullets would she use if it came to it.