Mark Clodi - Outbreak

The police car was parked behind a white four door sedan. The driver’s door was open but Max could not see the owner of the vehicle. Or the cop for that matter. Maybe they were on the other side of the car changing a tire. Or perhaps, in the dim morning light and based on the fact he was doing fifty five miles an hour he had just failed to notice them. Either way, Max was happy it was that guy, and not him, who had gotten the early morning ticket.

The last ten minutes of his drive were uneventful as he passed the usual landmarks; Mile High Stadium, the Gates Rubber factory and a few other exits before finally getting off of the freeway. A few minutes later Max had turned into his normal parking spot and killed the engine. Even though there were a hundred or so empty parking spaces Max always steered his truck to the same spot every morning, Monday through Friday. It was one of those "creature of habit" kind of things.

As he walked towards the side employee entrance that provided the shortest distance from the parking lot to his ground floor cube Max went over his to-do list for the day. First he had to email his buddy and see if…

"Max! Did you hear me? The dispatcher wants one of us to go to the main entrance and wait for the police. Since I'm on the phone that leaves you. Get going, I think I hear sirens."

That is how his day had begun, simple, quiet, normal. It had now evolved into something as far from his daily routine as he thought it could get. Pushing open the door to the hallway he wondered what he would find next.

The hallway was as quiet as church on a Friday night, that was not good. The main entrance was past Max’s desk and though he hated to do it he stopped by and picked up his ‘office’ bat. Signed by Steve Garvey this Louisville Slugger was a minor prize among the items in Max’s collection, not too valuable to keep in his shrine at work, just impressive enough to ‘ooh’ and ‘ahh’ his coworkers. Now if Garvey ever made it into the hall of fame, the bat would become something more treasured and might have to be brought home for the ‘wall of fame’ that Max was slowly building next to his mantle. For now it should prove useful if Fred or Nancy came calling. He made his way to the front doors of MAC co. without seeing anyone. The security guard the company employed to sit at the desk in the lobby didn't start until seven forty-five, so this was not unusual.

Without seeing anyone? Something was definitely wrong, a few phones were ringing, he did hear a muffled conversation, but he saw no one. In an office building, during business hours? On a Friday? Sure, sure it was only seven in the morning, but a few of the regulars should have been in by now. Max held his bat and waited, shifting his grip around, looking at the number ‘six’ on the end of the handle and the ‘Good luck, Steve Garvey’ in faded ink near the top of the bat. Bloodstains, were now pretty evident from Max’s grip, he looked around, thought for a moment, propped the front door open with a trash can and then ducked back into the hallway towards the men’s room. It had only been a couple minutes, no way the police could get here that quickly with the rush hour just starting but he didn’t want to take a chance of missing them.

Stepping into the men’s room the first thing Max saw was a pool of dried blood on the floor in front of the handicapped stall. That door was closed, but not completely. Max stopped, looked around and slowly lowered the tip of the bat down onto the floor then used this to lower his body down and get a look under the stall door. Two sets of legs, one, obviously on the pot, feet pointed towards the stall door, one set shuffling about slightly, pointed towards the toilet. Suddenly a slight sucking/chewing sound came from the stall, as if an animal had been feeding, was briefly interrupted and then decided to start eating again. Blood was running down the basin of the toilet bowl, towards the rear of the stall and the industrial sized drain located there.

Blood. Right. Max slowly stood up, looked over at the paper towel dispenser, at the door, at that handicap stall, then at the blood staining his precious bat. Tick. Tick. Tick. Between the sounds of eating Max could hear the sounds of his watch hand ticking in what seemed like thunderous noise to his ears. He took a step towards the paper towel rack, the eating sounds stopped, after a few seconds they resumed. Max took another step, the eating did not pause, two silent steps later Max was at the paper towel rack slowly easing towels out of the dispenser onto the counter next to the sink, steadily watching the stall door and listening to the sounds within. As he reached for more towels his hands found empty air, he swung around to see what the problem was and caught the bathroom view in the mirror above the sink.

A zombie! Right there! Max let out a scream and swung his bat up, the same time the zombie swung his arm up and around. Max whirled around swinging behind him in an instance, only no one, was there. He was still alone in the area in front of the sink. After a second Max realized he had not seen a zombie, he had seen his own reflection, bloody shirt, a thin line of blood vertical over his lips from when he ‘shhhh’ed Steve and wild eyes. He even had drying blood in his hair on one side, congealing and making the hair stand stiffly out from his head at a ninety degree angle. Max started laughing at his mistake, a kind of ‘whew glad that was nothing’ sort of laugh, that he could not stop himself from releasing. The noise from the handicap stall door swinging outward and hitting the wall startled Max from his revelry.

No one or better yet, no ‘thing’ immediately emerged from the stall. Seconds felt like minutes. Slowly Max again placed the end of his bat on the floor and used it to lower himself for a peek under the stall.

There were still two sets of legs but now both pairs of feet were pointing away from the toilet.

Fight or flight? Max had remembered hearing that statement but could not remember where. Had it been used to describe animal instincts on the Discovery Channel? He couldn’t recall. All he knew was that he had a decision to make and he had better make it quick.

Fight or flight?

The decision was made, flight sounded pretty damn good right about now especially since the close confines of the bathroom didn’t allow Max to swing his bat as freely as he would like. With three giant strides Max ran towards the handicap stall and with his right hand he slammed the door back towards the occupants inside. If Max could make it out into the hallway he was sure he could out run any pursuers.

Max didn’t know if it was his imagination but he sensed hands clawing at his back. This feeling caused the hair on the back of his neck to stand on end and gave him a queasy feeling in his stomach. He lowered his shoulder and blasted into the men’s room door swinging it wide open. The door clanged against the adjacent wall and slowly the pneumatic closer fastened at the top of the door started to move the door to the closed position. Too slowly.

The collision with the door spun Max around and he lost his balance and tumbled to the floor. He could hear the hollow sound of wood clanking on the hard floor tile as his bat bounced away from him. Max loved that sound, it reminded him of hot summer days spent watching overpaid baseball players and drinking cold beers.

Max rolled onto his stomach and then frantically crawled on all fours back to the men’s room door. From inside he heard a low moaning. When he reached the door he spun around and sat on his ass and braced the door shut with his back. Something tried to open the door. Max sensed himself once again starting to slide on the highly polished floor tiles. The door cracked open an inch.