by Mainak Dhar
Attacks from outside, and now tensions within Wonderland. That is why Alice is coming tonight to talk to us. I have gathered all of us as she instructed. I always look forward to her reading to us. At first she would read the old book that the Queen used to carry, a book with a story about a golden-haired girl who followed a rabbit down a hole, a story that foretold our own prophecy about a girl who would deliver us from the years of hiding and dying under the earth.
However, of late, as more new additions have joined us, Alice has started reading to us from a new book. A book written by General Konrath, which tells our tale—how we won our freedom, how humans and Biters are not as separate as you may think, and how Alice herself personifies that.
She is walking towards us now, and as always, all of us gather around. To Alice we are not an unnamed mass called Biters. She knows each of us, she gently strokes a few arms, asking how things are, plays with the kids, and then takes out the book.
I have heard this story many times, but I never tire of it. I chuckle inside as she reads about how she was out hunting Biters when she followed me down the hole in the ground, and several of the newcomers exclaim as she reads of the battles with Zeus and the Red Guards.
Then she puts the book away and speaks to us.
'There are bad men out there, and they have decided to wage war on us. War is not new to us, and we will destroy this new enemy, but there is an even more dangerous enemy in our midst, one we cannot destroy with a gun.'
Many of us are now leaning forward, trying to understand what she is talking about.
'That enemy lies within us, within the people there in Wonderland. That enemy is the fear and anger that made some of you lash out today. That enemy is the same hatred that made so many people hunt you.'
You think of us as mindless monsters, but we understand more than you give us credit for. Several heads are bobbing and many low growls are heard as we understand Alice's point.
'We cannot fight the enemy outside if we are fighting among ourselves. I need you all to promise me that you will not attack any of us within Wonderland no matter how scared you are. Neil will pick those of you who are fit for battle and those who are not will have to stay back here to avoid any accidents. Do you all understand?'
We do. Perfectly.
'Neil, walk with me.'
Alice says nothing for some time. Then she turns to me and says something I didn't expect at all.
'Neil, with all the chaos here, I do need you but there's something I needed to tell you. You may need to go far away, back to the Homeland.'
I growl in protest. I remember our trip to the Homeland, where we went into the very heartland of the Executive Committee and its Zeus troopers. I hated flying in the shaking, sputtering airplane they put us in, but that is not the biggest reason I do not want to go. Wonderland and all my friends are in danger and there is no way I am going so far away. I growl again and shake my head but Alice is not in a mood to listen.
'Neil, Doctor Edwards has been in touch with his friends back at the Homeland, and they are excited to learn that you can remember your name, that you are beginning to remember who you were. We already have a vaccine that prevents those bitten from being turned, but they feel that if they got to work with you, they might find something that brings back those memories, that makes you and others like you remember everything, maybe even speak again.'
I stand still, taking it all in. Could it really happen? Could they really help me put to rest the questions that have been on my mind? Could I really become this Neil again?
Then I think of my friends lying in the dust with their heads split open by bullets, of my human friends running in fear as attackers drive in for another raid. I growl and walk away.
This is my home and I will not go away when it is under attack.
***
Aalok and Salil are sitting near me. Both have bandages on their arms and faces from wounds suffered in the previous day's fighting. This time the attackers did not just shoot and run. They stayed and fought, firing rockets into Wonderland. Salil and his men hit back with their own rockets and set two of their vehicles on fire before the others ran. Six of my friends died, as did four humans.
Aalok winces as he drinks from his bottle, the mere act of lifting the bottle causing him pain where a bullet grazed his arm. Salil suffered a bad cut to the face but he does not show the pain. There are some people born to hunt and fight—he is one of them. But there are many more, people like Aalok, who are good, who trust others, but who will be easy prey for attackers like the men who raided us. That is why I want to stay.
Salil is angry about something and finally he throws the bottle in his hand to the ground, shattering the glass.
'How could they do this to us? Alice helped give them freedom!'
A man walks over. It is Doctor Edwards. I still don't fully understand why and how humans divide themselves into colors and nations, but he is from the Homeland, and at his appearance Aalok coughs, nudging Salil. But Salil is angry, and the bitter liquid that makes men act strangely is taking hold of him.
'Let him hear. The Homelanders stabbed us in the back after all we did together.'
Doctor Edwards is a gentle man and he sits down, placing an arm on Salil's shoulder.
'Salil, I understand why you're angry, but don't blame all of us. We are part of you—we have built this city together and bled to defend it.'
Salil is about to say something when Arjun walks by. He was one of the first to join us when Alice and I were in the ruins of the old city, hiding from Zeus troopers. When Alice is not here, he is the one who leads the humans.
'Guys, hope you weren't too badly hurt.'
Salil looks down, trying to control the anger I can feel within him. Arjun probably knows what is on his mind and sits down with us.
'Don't you get that they want us to turn on each other? All of us built this city up from rubble, all of us have made it what it is—folks from the Deadland, Homelanders and the Biters. This belongs to all of us, and we need to stick together.'
I can see why Alice trusts Arjun so much but Salil is not so easily satisfied.
'You saw what we captured? Top-of-the-line assault rifles that only the US Army had before the Rising, weapons that the Red Guards never had. Rifles that can fire around corners and launch airburst grenades programmed by onboard computers. How did these Red Guards get these unless someone in the Homeland supplied them?'
Arjun is silent. To me, any gun is the same as any other, but what was clear to me in the last battle was that our attackers were getting the upper hand till Alice rode into their midst, shooting dead a couple of them, even though she took two bullets to the body.
Arjun looks into the distance. The light from the Looking Glass is glowing in the distance. I know we are to meet Alice there to discuss the day's events.
'I suspect we'll have our answers soon enough, Salil.'
***
The man on the screen is old, with grey hair. I growl as he begins to speak and he looks at me with distaste. Then he turns his eyes back to Alice. I do not trust this man and I am hardly alone. Arjun looks away from the screen, not wanting to let the hatred in his eyes show.
Robertson is the man's name. He is the new leader in the Homeland after General Konrath died. I have heard the Homelanders in Wonderland saying that Konrath was murdered, that Robertson killed him to take over the leadership.
That is another way in which we are different from you. We kill, but to protect ourselves, not to chase things like power, things you cannot eat, hold or even see.
'Alice, I wanted to reach out to you to tell you what is happening and how you can help put an end to it.'
The screen fades and I see a row of burning sticks, arranged so that one stick is stuck in the ground and the other is tied across it. Then I see the bodies hanging from a tree. I growl in fury as I realize that they are all Biters. Men in white robes and white masks stand nearby. A big man with a gun aims at one of the hanging
Biters and shoots his head off. The screen returns to Robertson.
'The destruction of the Executive Committee was hailed as a liberation, but into that vacuum have stepped in all kinds of terrorist elements. While you were here, the Biters were at peace with humans, but now they ravage the countryside, and as you just saw, old evils are being resurrected. Men in masks, lynching and burning others, were a familiar sight many years ago in the old America. That evil is returning, driven by men retaliating against Biters.'
Alice spits out the words.
'President Robertson, you rule over the Homeland now. You have your armies at your disposal, so why do you allow this?'
Robertson shakes his head as if trying to be sad, but I see only his snake-like eyes.
'Ruling a small city like yours is one matter, but ruling a vast nation like ours is another. Before the Rising we had a huge cache of firearms in the possession of our citizens and with the anarchy spreading now, gangs have broken into old armories of the Executive Committee and stolen sophisticated weapons. There are just too many guns out there.'
What Robertson says next makes me want to reach into the screen and rip his throat out.
'To retain order, I have asked for all Biters to be kept in internment camps till order is restored and ordinary citizens are convinced that we can protect them. All private citizens have to surrender their firearms to the government. The Homeland is being placed under martial law to protect our citizens and remove the current environment of fear and terror.'
Alice spits out the words as she replies.
'What about the weapons we are being attacked with? There may have been remnants of Red Guards in the outlying areas, but they are attacking us riding in Humvees and armed with weapons the old US Army had. The Red Guards we used to fight had only Chinese weapons.'
Robertson shrugs, but I still see only his eyes. No regret, no emotion. And they call us the undead.
'There are elements who may be arming them. Alice, you do need to realize that some fundamentalist preachers here are calling you the Devil incarnate, half human and half Biter, and Wonderland as the spiritual home of the Biters who are ravaging us. They speak of a new Crusade to wipe out the threat the Biters pose. I am keeping them in check, but with the anarchy we have lived through in recent times, some weapons may well have been smuggled out.'
The screen goes blank and Alice picks up a chair and slams it against the wall. She screams out the rage we all feel.
'Everything we did, everything we sacrificed for the people of the Homeland and Robertson wipes it all out. And now he arms our enemies to prop up his own dictatorship.'
'What do we do now?'
Alice looks to Arjun and in her eyes is a look many an enemy has seen before being destroyed.
'We seek out these Red Guards and exterminate them. I don't know what Robertson wants. It could be revenge for us not letting him get his hands on the nuclear weapons on the Crocodile, or just hunger for power. Whatever it is, let Robertson know that we are not to be messed with.'
***
The wind blows against my face as the jeep races through the sand. Salil is driving, his rifle cradled across his lap, and Alice sits next to him, barking orders into the radio that Danish has patched all the jeeps with. I am standing in the open back, with four of my friends sitting around me. Six more jeeps drive through the open countryside. Three of them have large machine guns mounted on their backs, big evil weapons that shred men to pieces. The others are like the one I am on—carrying a human driver and gunner in front and Biters in the back. Today we are taking the battle to the enemy.
After three more days of constant raids, one of our trackers has found leads to the Red Guards' base. As we approach the area, I can see they have chosen well. Their base is hidden in some old mines, barely visible from a distance. But we are now on their trail.
'I see tire treads,' says Salil, the excitement of the hunt telling in his voice.
I don't need to see those marks. I can smell our enemies. Our prey.
The sun has not yet fully risen. Our enemies will be rousing themselves, still tired from the battle we fought just a few hours ago at Wonderland. Awake or asleep, they will soon be dead.
We stop at a distance and dismount. I gather my troops and we wait while Salil and two others crawl ahead with their long rifles slung across their back. Muffled shots ring out, masked by their silencers. Then Salil whistles.
The sentries are down. The time has come to attack.
I reach the camp before any of the others. Two Red Guards stumble into my path. I bite one on the shoulder and he goes down. The other stares stupidly at me, perhaps unable to believe what he sees. He falls a second later, clutching his ruined throat. They shuffle to their feet as I enter the camp. They have turned, but I have no intention of letting such evil men join my group as Biters.
My friends are now in the camp, and all around me men are screaming. Crying for mercy. A mercy they will not get. Two children died in yesterday's raid, one human and one of ours. The raiders shot them as if for sport. Now we will treat them as such. The two who had turned when I bit them die a few seconds later as Salil shoots them both in the head. Today we will take no prisoners.
Alice is to my left. I pause to see if she needs any help. She sweeps a man's feet from under him and in one smooth motion brings down her knife to his throat. Another Red Guard comes at her from her right, raising his rifle to his shoulder. Alice rolls away, bringing up her handgun, shooting him twice. He never gets up. A man shoots at me and the bullet grazes my shoulder. Fool—if you have to fight back, at least aim for the head. He is panicked and I can see the scream of terror forming in his mouth. A scream that never gets completed as I bite into his face.
I look up and my friends are all around me, the screams of the dying now overshadowing the occasional gunshot. Salil walks up to Alice.
'Twenty enemy KIA. We've got no losses as far as I can see. We've got four who surrendered, including the officer.'
'I'll talk to the officer. Shoot the rest.'
The five-year-old girl who was shot yesterday died in Alice's arms. It is rarely a good day to be her enemy, but today is not such a day.
Three shots, three bodies slump to the ground. Alice now stands over the officer.
'Who gives you your weapons? Tell me and I will only let you be bitten. Refuse and I shoot you in the head.'
Alice looks back to smile at me, a smile that terrifies the officer even more, as her face is smeared with blood. I growl back. I don't want to bite this evil man and have him join us. The way you are as a man influences how you turn out as a Biter. The evil bandits and Zeus soldiers whom we turned became the most aggressive and uncontrollable of us. This officer, who raids like a coward and doesn't think twice about shooting children, would just give trouble later if I bit him.
He makes my life easier by spitting at Alice.
She shoots him in the middle of the forehead.
***
THREE
I open my eyes and sit up straight. Biters don't dream, do they? So what did I just see? Why did it feel like a woman was calling me for breakfast, telling me I would be late for school? Why did it cause a pain in my chest when I realized I could not remember her face? Biters still have hearts, of course, but they are only organs inside of us, with none of the sentimental values you associate with them. What did I just feel? Who was that woman?
Neil's mother?
My mother?
I stumble out into the open, the rain drenching me. I stand there, looking up at the sky, soaking it in, as if the rain could wash away my confusion. Yesterday, I was a warrior, a hunter, who slashed and bit his enemies, tearing some of them to pieces. In the middle of that carnage and bloodshed, I was truly myself. Bunny Ears, protector, guardian, warrior. But the boy I remember would not have done any of that. He had no blood smeared across his clothes, no holes in his body where bullets had pierced him.
If I had a mother and a family, where are they
now? The life I know has been spent protecting Alice and Wonderland, but have I been able to protect my own family, or have I failed them?
I know the Biter I am, but what kind of a man was I?
Does it even matter?
I look up at the sky and scream, a roar that comes from deep within and does not subside for several moments.
Then Alice is beside me, holding my hand. She has her gun in her left hand. I close my eyes. What is happening to me?
'Neil, did you remember again?'
I nod and start to walk away, but Alice stops me.
'I remember who I was before I became who I am now. I remember my family and those I left behind. My father, always smiling, always trying to look out for me. My mother, always worried about the trouble I'd get into. And Jane, my sister, whom I fought with so often. I wish I could tell how much I miss her now.'
I try to tell her that perhaps not remembering is better for me. Perhaps all it does is confuse me and slow me down. I know who I am and what I am meant to do. I want things to be simple again. I don't know how much Alice understands of my growls, but I suspect she feels the same way.
'We all change—as we grow up, as we learn new things, as we deal with new circumstances. We have lived through dangerous and uncertain times when it's hard to predict what will come tomorrow and what we will have to do, to become in order to deal with them. At times like that, I remember who I was before to keep me from becoming something I don't want to be. I ask myself what my father would have thought of my choices, and that keeps me on the right path. I imagine him at my shoulder when I have to make tough decisions. That is the value of the past—an anchor that keeps you rooted in who you were.'
I understand all of that and I walk away, my mind much clearer.
I have such an anchor.
She is called Alice.
***
There was a time when everyone living with us in Wonderland could have fit in a small room. Now there are thousands of us, and I have discovered that humans, when they are not fighting or surviving, fret about things to entertain them. One would think the relief of sleeping without worry about enemies hunting you down would be enough, but as Alice says, with peace comes the need for mindless entertainment. So Danish has rigged up a giant screen in a big structure we used as a base for our operations in the early days. Humans played sports there before the Rising. Now every week, people gather there to watch movies.