April
an excerpt

A red light under a sign that said, "Do not disturb while light is on," told her that she should not enter the room where the scientist sat working, so she knocked on the glass to get his attention, smiling as he startled, head never turning from his work, though he held up one finger to show her that he had heard her pound for attention. She watched as he ran his hand through his head of hair, the way his mouth fit into a frown for a moment as he filled in something on the paper sitting before him.

She found it odd that, before coming to this place, she had been afraid nearly every day of her life. She had not been one of the ones who would show it, but she had feared mostly that she would one day run out of luck, that those creatures would find that nothing in the fires would harm them and enter her home, leaving her to turn into one of them.

He finished whatever he needed to do, and turned to her, waving her in and changing the light from lit to dark. When she entered, he placed a kiss on her lips but pulled away before she could ask for more. "How did you make your way down here?" he asked.

"I had that one girl--Sara?--helped me get here. She was very helpful."

"I'm glad you paid attention to the light, then." He looked over at his desk, then moved to it, straightening it up as he did so. He pushed several sheets of paper into a small pile and slid them into the top drawer of his desk.

"What can I do for ya?"

"Well, I was kind of hoping you would give me a tour of what you do here. You never did get to on my official tour day, so I thought I'd surprise you." She paused for a moment, then added one of the benefits of her visit, "Plus, I thought there would be some nice, dark corners to find." His eyes seemed to light up in understanding.

"There are definitely dark corners abounding in this area of the building." She loved when he tried to make his voice more deep, but it did not stay that way for long, turning more serious as he reentered the conversation. Though are you sure you want a tour? A lot of the work I do down here is fairly...well it's very controversial. I don't want you hating me because of something I do."

"I'm sure I will be fine with whatever it is they have you do down in this dark hull of a place," she told him, and she meant it, laying a hand on his arm.

"All right," he sighed. Picking up his white lab coat, he opened the door and ushered her out. She stood back as he locked the door with a practiced motion and slid the key into the pocket of his slacks.

***

He led her, first, into the containment area. Three zombies were in different cells along the walls, each in varying degrees of decay.

"What is this place?"

"We use it to contain an zombie that gets too close to the building during April. We use them for study subjects until they are no longer viable." Her face was stuck staring at the closest one. It's dark eyes stared back at her. Without an iris, pupil taking over the entirety of its only eye, it made a high-pitched moaning noise and came at the glass that separated it from the rest of the room.

Coranne took a quick step back, and with a hand that was made mostly of rotted flesh, slammed at the glass. It snarled at them, showing off a bloody, toothless mouth. Another slam brought his eyes to the other two zombies in the room. They had both drug themselves to peer at the woman. The one furthest from them, skin falling off in moist, green clumps had even managed to prop itself up against the wall. He watched the vocal chords rattle as a deep sound forced its way through that creature's throat.

The other two followed its example, though they had enough left of their bodies to leave streaks of blood against the windows.

"I don't understand," he muttered, more to himself than to Coranne, "they can't even see us." He put a hand on her arm, and she gave a shrieking cry, moving her hand to cover her mouth when the shrieks that came from the cages seemed to amplify in sound.

"We should leave," he said as quietly and as calmly as possible.

"Please."