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Chapter 2: Grandma's here!

I went out a while later to check out the state of the rest of the campus. It looked pretty normal. The sun shone contrarily in the sky surrounded by nothing but blue expanse. The air smelled terrible. My stomach grumbled uncomfortably and I tried to ignore it. I was walking by the lake and noticed one of my professors slumped and mumbling to him self by a tree.

"Professor Anderson," I waved to him with my bandaged arm. He looked up the same way the girl next door did. I walked over and crouched down. He had chunk missing from his shoulder and left leg. "Man, you were my favourite prof . . . "

My phone rang and distracted me from what might have been an upsetting moment.

"Sugar," My grandmother's warm voice came through and I walked away from the professor. "Are you alive?"

"Well . . ." I sighed. How do you tell your own grandmother you've just died. "A little bit anyways."

"Oh bugger," She cursed in the way she did when she found that she had forgotten to buy milk at the store. I love my Gran. She raised me in the absence of my parents. "Well, I'm coming, so hold tight."

"Gran, do you know what's going on here?" I asked, looking into the murky water of the pond. There was someone at the bottom, chewing on a fish. I grimaced.

"Of course I know!" She crackled through the phone. "You know how well connected I am."

Its true. She's in four book clubs, two bridge clubs, volunteers at the hospital, attends a seniors yoga class, and owns a small bookstore which has an incredibly social cult following. Every branch of her social life has a truly unbelievable number of arms reaching out from it.

"Nora from yoga has a brother-in-law in the capital who curls with someone who's daughter is an assistant to the assistant of the minister of health." She explained quickly. "Apparently, some idiot mixed up deliveries and brought the wrong package to your school's bio-chemics lab and when they opened it, this Siberian monkey virus got out. You know, this is exactly why I'm so particular about properly reading labels!"

"Jeezus, Gran," I had to sit down under the weight of what she had just told me. I was totally grossed out that I had some monkey virus running rampant inside me.

"Yes, well, they've quarantined the school for now until they figure out a way to stop it's spread." She told me. "How do people seem to be taking it?"

"Well all the ones I can see are four steps from become vegetables," I got up and started walking back to the main campus. "Any one who didn't get bitten is locked inside the library. Kay is in there, so that's good. But everyone outside is a zombie. Seriously."

"But you're not?" Gran asked after a moment of hesitation.

"I got bitten."

"Well, how are you then?" She asked after another pause. She had always been careful to get all the facts before flying off the handle.

"I don't seem to have a heartbeat, Gran," I looked around, and shaded my eyes from the sun. Some zombies were slumped in the fountain by the flag pole. "And what's weirder is that I don't feel too freaked out by any of this."

"Well, you get that from me Sugar," She said factually. "Alright. Obviously, things could be worse for you. I'm going to get there as soon as I can. I'm just grabbing a few supplies now, so I'll be on the road in an hour or so. Try to get in touch with Kay and tell her what's going on. I'll call you if I hear anything else."

"Alright, love you, Gran," I said, nodding, even though she couldn't see me.

"Love you, Sugar." And she hung up.

I called Kay in impart this new information to her. She seemed rather distracted on the phone and when I asked her what was wrong, I learned that one of the shelving assistants from the library had a small bite and was starting to get weak.

"Kick her out." I said immediately. I didn't know why, but my stomach tightened as I said it. "If anybody else gets bitten everyone else in there is going up the river with the rest of us. I may be functioning, but I'm literally one in two thousand."

"I know," Kay said a little uncertainly. This was unlike her.

"You know what," I said. "Go to the main doors of the library with her and I'll meet you there."

There was a long silence on the other end as Kay contemplated this. I knew she was thinking I might be corrupted. That I might try to force my way in when the door was unlocked and feast on everyone inside.

"Look, I'll just go into the eatery of the caf," I suggested. "You'll be able to see me but there will be glass and a hallway between us just in case."

"Okay," She finally agreed, sounding more resolved. I'll be down in ten minutes."

I walked to the library and called Kay again. "Give me another ten minutes, there are some people hanging around the entrance."

After shunting off the lay bouts and stuffing all the visible ones into a conference room off the main hall, Kay appeared at the door with a small, terrified looking girl who seemed to be fighting against Kay a little. I was walking by at that moment and stopped right in front of the door. I waved and smiled encouragingly. Kay took in my pale, black-eyed appearance and took a deep breath. I gave her the universal hand sign for "Just a second," and jogged to the eatery, where I was safely away and behind blood smeared glass. I gave her the thumbs up. She unlocked the door, said something to the girl and shoved her out, quickly closing the door again and locking it. She gave me the "O.K." and I walked out of the eatery and ran over to the girl. She looked up at me terrified and gave a horrible, blood(if I had any to curdle) curdling scream.

"Oh, shut up," I told her. I had been slightly afraid that, once in the presence of a living human, I might suddenly be overcome with the urge to chow down. This was (thankfully) not the case. I fact, I was repulsed by the very idea of it. "I don't want to eat you."

Apparently unsatisfied by my good word, she fainted. Jeezus, some people have a delicate sensibility. I propped her up on the wall and sat down in front of the door. Kay sat down on the other side of the door and called me. We chatted for a while and joked about how scenes like that in movies usually meant someone was in jail.

"I feel like I'm in jail." Kay sighed, looking around the library. "I always loved these types of libraries. But right now, I don't care much for it."

I laughed. "You sounded funny just there." Occasionally, I got the impression that Kay was anything but normal. Downright alien. It was part of the reason I had befriended her. My stomach grumbled suddenly and my mouth watered. "Ugh, I'm so hungry!"

Kay's eyes moved almost suggestively to the girl laying beside me. I frowned. "Hey, don't knock it till you've tried it." Kay shrugged. "She was mean to me earlier when I asked where the astronomy books were."

"Kay," I shook my head and tsked. "I don't want to eat anyone."

"Just a nibble," She joked. I glanced over at the girl. "It wouldn't be the first time I've seen something like that."

"What?" I looked back to Kay. "You've witnessed bold-faced acts of cannibalism? I know you're not from this country, but I didn't think that sort of thing happened anymore."

Someone appeared then near the escalator behind Kay. I looked around her and waved at the speckled man. His eyes widened with horror and he ran back up the escalator. Kay looked back. "I'd better go."

"Sure," I nodded. "I'll call if I hear from Gran again."

Kay disappeared up the escalator after the man and I set my sight on the girl, who's forehead was dampened with feverish sweat. I looked back to where Kay had been and then to the girl again. I looked at the bite on her hand, took a deep breath and . . .