Chapter Ten: To Serve and Protect

 

It was not difficult to find Jasmine’s parent’s house. They lived inside the safe zone on the north side of town. My best friend had invited me over for dinner there a few times back when we were serving together in the Starside Police Department. I knew them well enough, but that did not make my task any easier.

Both of her parents had survived the initial outbreak. Like their daughter, the elder Johnsons were tenacious and fearless. They had rallied their neighbors to fight the zombies, and the little unit they formed joined up with The Mayor’s militia early on during the battle. Jasmine always said that her mother was good at hiding her emotions, but I saw a different side of the woman as I was walking towards the front door. My best friend’s mother swung open the door and took a step outside while I was still ten feet away. There were tears streaming down her face. I did not have to say a word to tell her what happened. I had arrived without her daughter, and that was all she needed to know.

Her husband helped her back inside and warmly invited me to join them. I had tried to suppress my emotions for a month while I focused on keeping Lara alive, but they came rushing to the surface as I watched Jasmine’s mother weep. Jasmine’s father asked what happened after a moment, and I told him the truth. His daughter had died the way she lived. Through his anger and sadness I could see that he was proud that his daughter had sacrificed herself in an attempt to save a child. I broke down and apologized profusely, but Jasmine’s mother took my hand and assured me that they did not blame me for her death. She said that Jasmine had spoken highly of me from the first week we were paired up as partners. They had never seen Jasmine happier than when she was off trying to save the world with me. Their daughter had wanted to make a difference, and they were happy that she had the opportunity to live the life she wanted. Jasmine’s mother thanked me for taking the time to come and inform them of their daughter’s passing.

I spent a few hours with Jasmine’s parents swapping stories about her, crying and laughing. It felt good to have a moment to finally rest and mourn the loss. The conversation grew strained after a while, and I reluctantly took my leave. We had all loved Jasmine, but I was not part of their family. They needed time to grieve alone.

I sat in Alexandra’s car for a few minutes after leaving the Johnson house. A sharp hunger pain tore through my stomach, and I kept my eyes closed for thirty seconds until it passed. I tried to start the car but my hand was shaking so violently that I had difficulty getting the key into the ignition. I took a deep breath, grabbed my right hand with my left and held it against my chest for a moment. The effects of starvation were really starting to take their toll on me. I pulled away from Jasmine’s parent’s house a minute later after the shaking subsided.

I did not have a destination in mind. Anthony had bought his parents a house in Florida after earning millions of dollars from the social networking website that he designed. There was no way to contact them to let them know about their son’s death. Admittedly, they likely had not survived the zombie outbreak and Hitler’s death squads anyway. I drove aimlessly around the streets of Starside as I had many times back when I was a police officer, albeit with several key differences. The activity seemed hollow without Jasmine sitting next to me, and she had usually been the one driving during our patrols. I was also patrolling with the sun still out, which would not have happened before Lara and her team developed the SPF 1000.

I was no longer a police officer, but it still felt good to act like one again. I had spent so much time over the last few years trying to run the country or defeat aliens that it was nice to return to the less complicated job. I pulled the car over to the side of the road while I was driving down a residential street after noticing some citizens in need of assistance. A boy and a girl, likely no older than twelve, were staring up at a tree in the front lawn of a house. The tree’s leaves had fallen to the ground months earlier, so it was easy to spot the black cat who was clinging to one of its branches.

“Is your cat stuck up there?” I asked as I approached.

“It’s not our cat,” the little girl explained. “It’s a stray that we’ve been taking care of.”

I stood next to the children, cupped my hand above my eyes and looked up at the animal. “Oh yeah? What’s his name?”

The little girl looked up at me like I was an idiot. “It’s a stray. It doesn’t have a name,” the precocious preteen declared. “Aren’t you President Whittier? My mom used to say that you are the best leader this country has had in decades.”

Having left office with such a low approval rating, I was taken aback by the compliment. “Aw, that’s nice of her to say.”

“My mom also said that the bar was set really low,” the little girl clarified.

The boy glanced up at me and narrowed his eyebrows. “Why does your face look that way?” he questioned undiplomatically.

“Chickenpox, smallpox and bubonic plague,” I answered.

“Cool,” the boy said as he leaned closer to inspect the scars on my face. “I think they make you look like a badass.”

I chuckled, took a few steps forward and planted my foot against the tree’s trunk. It was an easy climb, and the cat was content to let me bring him back to ground level. The children cheered and thanked me as I handed the animal over to the little girl.

“All right, you two take good care of this little guy. I used to have a cat too, so I know how much love and attention they need,” I lectured.

“What happened to your cat?” the little boy inquired.

“He... uh... moved to a farm up north,” I lied.

“Daddy says that there isn’t anything up north,” the girl countered snottily. “He says everyone outside of Starside was brutally killed by the zombies.”

“Yes... but the zombies don’t like to eat kitty cats... unless they’ve been cuddling up to a human for hours and smell like one of them,” I admitted. “Just make sure you feed the little fella and give him plenty of water.”

“I cut open a couple of bags of cat food and left them where he can get them in case the zombies kill us,” the girl explained.

I knelt down and smiled at her. “You shouldn’t worry about that. You’re way too young to be so morbid.”

She shrugged her shoulders. “Daddy says I’m a product of my environment.”

The children were likely in need of several months of sessions with a psychologist, but I figured that rescuing the cat was the most I could do. I chalked it up as a victory and returned to my car to continue the patrol. I drove to a commercial district that had been run-down long before the zombie outbreak. The tourism boom that occurred after Starside became the focal point for all things vampire had revitalized most of the city, but the district I entered had never been able to bounce back. The zombie outbreak had changed society’s priorities, and the handful of stores that had been there were now closed. If the dregs of society still existed, I knew that I would find them there.

I only drove a few blocks before I saw a familiar face. She had told me once in a bar that her name was Pauline, but I could have sworn I knew her from years earlier at the hospital where I used to work. I could not put my finger on it, and it was possible that she looked a lot different now than she had when I saw her at McClane County General Hospital. Anyway, she was a hideously unattractive woman. Pauline was tall, muscular and wearing a neon green cocktail dress and fishnet stockings despite the cold weather. The attire showed off both her legs and her cleavage, but I would have preferred not to see either of the ugly woman’s features. She had long, blonde hair but it was obviously a wig. I pulled up next to her and rolled down the passenger’s window.

“You looking for a good time, sugar?” Pauline asked in an incredibly deep voice. She snorted in amusement as she stuck her head inside the window. “Oh, it’s you.”

“Don’t worry,” I said quickly. “I’m not here to bust you.”

“I ain’t worried. You ain’t no cop no more,” Pauline smiled. “Besides, The Mayor don’t care ‘bout turning tricks. All the po-po who worked vice got rolled into the department’s zombie squad. Same thing with narcotics. The pigs wouldn’t have many of those crimes to investigate now anyways. I haven’t seen any other girls out here for months. They all worrying ‘bout guarding the fences and shit.”

“But not you?” I questioned.

Pauline rolled up the bottom of her dress to reveal a wooden stake taped to her inner thigh. “I can do both,” she explained. “Sometimes them monsters slip through. It’s good to have people patrolling the interior, and a girl’s got to have her fun,” she finished with a smile. “You thinking you like what you see? I wouldn’t mind gettin’ my freak on with the former leader of the free world. I can be all like Veronica Chudzinski and shit.”

I tried not to grimace but failed. “Tempting... but I’m afraid I wouldn’t have the energy to keep up with you,” I answered in order to spare her feelings. “Maybe you can help me another way though. I’m looking for a terrible human being to eat. Can you think of any?” I asked. I watched as she thought for a moment and then shook her head. “No crack dealers? No pimps? No gangbangers?”

“Sorry,” Pauline said. “The ones who didn’t die all went straight. Everybody has really come together and pitched in to help the city. It’s become a real... what do you call it... utopia.”

I thanked the masculine prostitute and quickly departed. It was depressing news. As I feared, it seemed that there were no terrible people left to eat in the entire city. I checked a few more slums over the course of the next hour, but I had no luck. I was just about to abandon my search and return the car to Alexandra when I heard a woman scream. I stepped on the gas and barreled through a red light on my way towards the noise. I found two police officers in the front parking lot of an old electronics store. Both were armed with wooden stakes, and the corpses of a half dozen zombies littered the area around them. Another ten zombies were still staggering towards them from all directions, and they were about to be overwhelmed.

I pushed down harder on the accelerator and tightened my grip on the steering wheel. Two of the zombies turned their heads at the noise, but they lacked the intelligence and agility necessary to dive out of the way. I plowed through four of the zombies, sending blood and body parts flying. My windshield cracked as one of the undead landed against it, much like the deer I had hit earlier in the day. I put the car into park and leapt out of the vehicle. Most of the zombies I had hit were still on the ground repairing themselves. The two officers had turned towards the threats that were still mobile, and I ran over to assist. The three of us staked all the zombies in the area quickly.

Huffing and puffing, I withdrew my weapon from the chest of the last zombie. “Officer Isles, Officer Tubbs,” I said, finally having a chance to greet them.

“Officer Whittier,” Isles said with a smile. “I heard through the grapevine that you were in Starside. Glad you were here to save our asses.”

Another officer ran around from the back of the electronics store before I had a chance to respond. He held a bloody stake in one hand, and his face was red. I recognized the cop as Officer Lacey, who was another of the men I had served with back when I worked as a police officer in Starside.

“Stabler?” Tubbs asked the newest arrival.

Lacey shook his head sadly. “He got bit. I had to put him down. We’ve got bigger problems than that though. I just got the call, and there’s a small hole in the fence over near Roosevelt Avenue. That’s how these zombies got in.”

“Let’s roll,” I responded.

Lacey shook his head and waved for the rest of us to follow him as he jogged towards his police cruiser. “The militia is working on the breach. The SPD is in charge of killing the ones that are already inside. Us and the other cops in the area have been driving around with our sirens blaring to attract the zombies in an attempt to get them away from the civilians. The tactic worked a little too well. There are at least 150 zombies converging at the makeshift station we set up. They’re assaulting precinct 13!”

The three officers and I piled into the cruiser and sped towards the police station. So much had happened in the time since I wore the blue uniform. My comrades did not care that I was a vampire or a celebrity. In the heat of the moment, none of that mattered. As far as they were concerned, I was a cop. They respected me and trusted me to watch their backs just as they had when we served together five years earlier. I could not help but smile as I sat in the car with my fellow officers and raced towards danger.

The makeshift police station was only two blocks away, and it was not difficult to see where help was needed. The station was actually a McDonald’s that had been converted by the Starside Police Department. The horde of zombies was staggering towards the front entrance, but the amount of corpses on the ground proved that their ranks had been cut down significantly. A dozen uniformed officers were guarding the building with crossbows. They were split into two groups of six, and they had developed a good strategy. The front row would fire and then kneel down to reload so that the officers behind them could unleash a volley. Once the first row was done reloading they stood up and the cycle repeated. This allowed for a constant stream of arrows to fly at the enemy force, but it was not enough. Many zombies fell to the ground, but the mass continued to advance. Lacey, Isles, Tubbs and I exited the cruiser and dashed towards the front entrance.

I received a lot of smiles from the familiar faces in the group, but we did not have time for a proper reunion. The three other newest arrivals and I grabbed crossbows from a pile next to the door and set up a third firing line. The added firepower turned the tide of the siege. The size of the herd of zombies quickly diminished. With an arrow lodged in his chest, the final attacker fell to the ground a mere foot away from the front line. The defenders breathed sighs of relief and broke ranks.

“Faith and begorrah!” The Chief exclaimed as he approached me and extended his hand. “I was preparing to kiss our Blarney Stones goodbye! Is there a field of four-leaf clovers underfoot that I missed?” the walking Irish stereotype asked. He made a point to look down at the parking lot. “I’m glad to see you, Nicky Boy.”

“I’m happy to help,” I said. “And I’m glad you got your job back. You look much better than the last time I saw you when you were a disgusting, strung out bum who was speaking nonsense.”

“Aye,” The Chief admitted. “It took more than a bath to wash my despair away. ‘tis The Mayor who I have to thank. He helped set me on the straight and narrow after he cleaned himself up. I had chased many a leprechaun in my life, but I discovered that sobriety was the true pot o’ gold. The Mayor pulled some strings after the outbreak when he became the de facto leader of the city, and he restored me to my rightful position within the SPD.”

I congratulated my former boss on being reinstated. Truthfully though, he had deserved to be fired. He had failed to figure out that I was the Urinator serial killer even after I walked into his office and admitted it. In fact, aside from Jasmine and me, all of the members of the Starside Police Department were terrible at investigating crimes. It hardly mattered anymore since their duties had shifted from finding criminals to keeping the streets clear of zombies. Despite their shortcomings, they were brave men and women who were certainly up to the new task.

My reunion with The Chief and my other former colleagues lasted twenty minutes. We mourned the officers who had fallen in the line of duty since the start of the outbreak. Everyone was saddened to hear of Jasmine’s death, and The Chief ordered a special moment of silence for her. We shared stories about her notoriously short temper and then transitioned to general funny stories that happened back when Jasmine and I were on the force. The younger cops, who had not been around back then, were enthralled when I told the tale of the punk kid who shot me and the track star I had accidentally bitten. Several of the older cops admitted that, in retrospect, it had been pretty obvious that I was a vampire. Two of my former colleagues made public apologies for the way they had treated me after I was captured and put on trial for murdering Christina. I accepted their apologies immediately as I did not blame them. At the time they had only seen me as a freak and a killer. They had been shocked to learn that vampires were real, but they got more comfortable with the idea in the years that followed. I had been pardoned for the crime that I was wrongly convicted of, and they watched me fight to save humanity. They now knew what kind of man I was, and they no longer viewed me as a monster.

A young officer emerged from inside the McDonald’s with a piece of scratch paper in his hand. “Major Winchester reports that the militia has sealed the breach,” he said to The Chief. “No other reports of zombies in the area, but we just got a call about a balcony collapse at an apartment over on Hooper Road. It sounds bad.”

“I’ll take it,” Tubbs declared as he snatched the address out of the younger cop’s hand.

“I’ll come too,” I said.

The Chief ordered several more officers to join us, and we took two police cruisers over to the apartment building. Several ambulances were pulling up as we got there. The emergency services in Starside were impressive. In fact, aside from the zombie attack, life in the city was not too much different than how I remembered it. The Mayor, and the city’s residents, had done an amazing job of preserving civilization.

The officers and I ran towards the moans of agony and cries for help. It was a chaotic scene. A small group of teenagers had been partying on the balcony when it gave out beneath them. One young man was dead, and there were a number of serious injuries. We helped the paramedics get the wounded onto stretchers and then loaded them up in the ambulances.

“Six trauma patients,” one of the paramedics remarked unhappily as he prepared to close the doors in the back of the ambulance. He wiped his sleeve across his forehead to mop up some sweat. “McClane County General is going to be in trouble. They’re already short-staffed as it is.”

I grabbed the door’s handle as it was swinging shut, pulled it open and climbed up to join the paramedic. “It’s okay,” I said in response to the man’s look of confusion. “I’m a doctor.”