A Time to Die by Mark Wandrey Page A

screams sounded again, this time by many more voices raised together. Vance turned the sound down a little: it was inhuman and difficult to listen to. Most of the crowd was past the troops now, who were trying to reorganize and treat their wounded. Vance was surprised to see the men all appeared alive and largely uninjured. A few guns were missing, and even one of the heavy machine guns had been carted off by the crowd. In fact, the mass of civilian wounded far outnumbered the military. They were once again organized enough that they were stopping the crowd. Using batons and tear gas grenades, the soldiers finally regained control.
    That scream, close by now, and the camera moved to the end of the block where the crowd had first appeared. One young woman staggered around the corner clasping an infant to her chest. Blood covered her left side and she was having trouble standing. No sooner did she round the corner than a pair of bloody hands followed her and grasped the infant. She screamed “No, por favor, no!” and tried to hold on. The child’s tiny cries reached the microphone, but only for a second as it was snatched away from her.
    “No!” she yelled again, and was tackled by a man. Vance watched, unable to look away as he suspected he was about to see a rape take place as the man tore at her clothes, exposing one breast and part of her wounded side. Instead the man fell to her and bit the exposed breast, tearing away a huge flap of bloody flesh!
    “Oh,” Vance choked, “oh God what?”
    The woman shrieked and tried to pull free, rolling under the man and pulling at the sidewalk. Vance could see her fingers nails tear away and leave bloody streaks on the cement. The man clawed again, and then bit. This time finding her neck from behind. Vance imagined he could hear the bone crunching as she spasmodically jerked and lay still.
    Two other men appeared, racing around the corner. They paused for half a second to observe the man and his grisly meal before racing up the street towards the stalled mob. They looked like a business man and a waiter, both dressed for work, only both were obviously injured and both obviously insane. Then they screamed, that mind wrecking sound from hell — in person this time. In a moment they fell upon the rear of the crowd, tearing into people with fingernails and teeth like… like… zombies?!
    “No fucking way,” Vance whispered, then looked around as if someone was witness to his insane thought. He was of course alone, and that bothered him too. Was this some sort of elaborate deception?! Was that possible? It would take a Hollywood special effects company a week to do this.
    “They’re… they’re…” the camera man stammered, looking for the words, “they’re eating people,” he almost whispered. The camera fell back to the corner once more where the woman’s killer was back on his feet, blood running down his chin as he chewed a mouthful of flesh and looked around with wild eyes. Vance found himself wishing he could see the look on the man’s face better, then instantly changed his mind. He didn’t think he could survive that look if he were to ever see it clearly. As if the very viewing of that face of malevolent evil would forever ruin a part of his psyche.
    From around the corner came another man, holding something small in his arms he was taking big ripping mouthfuls of flesh from it. Vance tried to comprehend what he was seeing, then recognized a tiny hand as another bite was taken, and he screamed himself this time.
    Vance slammed the lid closed on the laptop and stood with a shudder, backpedaling away from the computer desk, his feet caught on the desk chair and he crashed backwards to the floor, smashing his tailbone painfully and making his head slap hard against the linoleum tile. He took no notice, but crab-walked backwards to get as far away from that unspeakable abomination he’d just witnessed. He came up against the opposite wall, tears pouring down his