Patrick D'Orazio - Coming the Dark

He gave brief directions to Megan. They would take one of the less-traveled routes with the hope that it would not be too congested with stalled traffic. It would lead them directly to Gallatin.

Jeff fiddled with the radio as they rolled along. He began with AM, pressing ‘seek’ and letting it run through the static. It lapped the entire band with no results. He switched to FM and repeated the process. There was nothing, not even an automated emergency broadcast. Those messages had been looped to play over and over, nonstop, when all the live broadcasts had vanished. Even the recorded voices had disappeared off the airwaves.

Megan reached over to turn the radio off. Jeff had already sat back and was staring off into space. He barely noticed when the hiss of static disappeared.

He snapped out of his trance a few minutes later when Megan slowed the car and turned left. The intersection was clear of traffic, though several cars and eighteen-wheelers sat on both sides of the road. There were huge crease marks on many of the vehicles, as if something like a bulldozer had pushed them out of the way. As he looked, he spotted no heavy machinery in the area. There were a few sideways skid marks on the asphalt, but no other hints as to what might have happened.

As they left the crossroad, Jeff dismissed the damaged vehicles and their possible meaning from his mind. He closed his eyes and began to drift off. It felt like only a few seconds later when he heard the van slowing to a stop.

Lifting his head, he glanced at Megan and then looked out his window to see what she was staring at. He was about to shake his head and tell her it was a bad idea to stop there when he saw the expression on her face. He looked a bit more closely at the building near which they were parked.

It was a small brick-fronted church with a wooden sign out front. There was little ornamentation to the edifice itself. The roof was pointed, and several long, narrow windows faced the road. A small indentation in the building served as the entryway, with its glass double doors still intact.

Beside the doorway was the one thing that differentiated the church from all the others they had seen on their short journey. It was a tall wooden structure, nearly as high as the doors themselves. From a distance, one might mistake it for a miniature steeple, but the sign out front made it clear what this decorative feature was.

The wooden sign in front of the church was decorated with a circular graphic and the words “Lighthouse Baptist Fellowship” painted in bright yellow letters on a brown background. A picture of a sea cliff with a lighthouse shining down on a rocky shore was carved below the lettering. There was a space for the “Message of the Week” underneath, which read: “Revelations 6:8 And behold, a pale horse, and he who sat on it, his name was Death. Hades followed with him. Authority over one fourth of the earth, to kill with the sword, with famine, with death, and by the wild animals of the earth was given to him.”

“Not very original,” Jeff smirked. Megan frowned but kept looking at the modest doors of the church. There was nothing grand about the place. No stained glass, no bell to summon the congregation, no statues of Jesus. Just a tidy little building with quite a few cars crammed into its small parking lot.

Jeff resisted saying anything else or asking questions. If Megan was saying a prayer for the dearly departed or reminiscing about the good old days, he could manage to keep his mouth shut while she did. He studied the church further and saw that there were no signs of attack around the perimeter or in the parking lot. The area looked clear of bodies. Relaxing, he decided to sit and wait until Megan was ready to get rolling again.

The peaceful scene exploded less than a minute later when several gangrenous congregants burst through the doors of the church, slouching toward them. There was a sharp intake of breath to Jeff’s left as it happened. He, on the other hand, felt surprisingly calm as more and more stiff forms poured out of the building. Most wore suits and what had once been pretty dresses before their owners started to bloat, leak, and weep caustic fluids.

The first woman out the door was gussied up in her Sunday best with several silk flowers still stuck in the wispy gray hair that now floated above her skull like writhing snakes. The flowers retained some of their faux beauty, though they were smudged and smeared with caked grease. Stripes of gore mixed with the soft silken white petals, giving them a zebra-like appearance. She and those that followed limped toward the minivan over the burnt lawn of the church.

Jeff forced his eyes off the growing rabble and back toward Megan.

She was still looking toward the entrance, her eyes moist, though she wasn’t crying. He moved to block her view of the mass of corrupt forms moving toward them, but Megan didn’t even blink when he did.

When she spoke a moment later, her voice sounded far off, distant.

“We were told it would be safe here. They said we should come with them. Why did this happen? I don’t understand.”

“They were infected like everyone else.”

The bitter words caught Megan’s attention, and her eyes refocused on Jeff. She looked angry but also fractured and unsure of herself.

“God couldn’t protect them, Megan. No one could. If you had come here with them, you would have been infected too, no matter how hard you prayed.”

Jeff started to see the cold fire in Megan’s eyes that he had seen before. He wanted to shrink back, but something inside compelled him to push harder.

“God helps those who help themselves.” He jerked his head backwards, not daring to look at the onrush of bodies. “They were lambs led to the slaughter. Hell, it doesn’t even look like they barred the doors. They probably just kept on praying and thought the rapture was coming.”

Megan’s face went nuclear. “You coldhearted bastard! I had friends in there, not that you give a shit!”

Jeff returned the angry look, his peppered with frustration. “Megan, it doesn’t matter if I care! What difference would it make if I said I was sorry they were infected?” He paused, but realized he had already said too much. His face betrayed his regret for a moment and then shifted back to anger to hide his embarrassment. “I AM sorry, okay? Does that make you feel any better?”

Megan’s expression didn’t change. Jeff tried to collect himself and calm down as he heard the moans getting closer. He took a deep breath and reached out to touch her. Megan shrank away, her expression appalled.

“All I really want right now is for the two of us to stay alive. We can’t wait around for God, or anyone else for that matter, to show up and save us.” There was a hint of desperation in Jeff’s voice as he pointed behind his back. “And I really don’t want the good folks from the Baptist Fellowship to take us on home to Jesus. So can we get out of here? Now, please?”

Megan gave him another dark look, her arms crossed as Jeff waited. He looked ready to jump up and push her out of the driver’s seat. The stretch between the church and road was not that big, and many of the stumbling figures had crossed most of it already, their greedy fingers stretching out to clutch at the two survivors.

“I am sorry, Megan. I really am.” Jeff could feel a tingling in his neck where he had been nearly strangled the day before. At the same time, he was beginning to imagine an army of ghouls smashing through the window and tearing him to pieces.

Megan shook her head and took hold of the steering wheel. She stamped down on the gas pedal, and the wheels spit up gravel as they caught hold of the road. Jeff was pushed back in his seat, and his contrite expression changed to one of surprise.