The Last Virus

by Caleb Adams

  ✽ ✽ ✽

  It is 5:17 a.m. Dawn is readying her carriage for another journey across the earth sky. How beautiful that will be. How I wish I could be there for her arrival. I have only one last entry. And God, it is for you. Please, when I die and my soul is to take, I ask that you not put a uniform on it and ask me to fight. As you can see, I am only a translator and not a soldier.

  The Nurse

  Nurse’s Entry Log, Patient #12

  Time: 12:19:00 Day: 6 Month: Dhul-Qa’dah

  Gender: Male Height: 5’11” Chest: 41” Arm Length: 35 1/4”

  Weight: 129 lbs. Shoe Size: 12

  Notes: Measurements arrived yesterday and recorded. By photo taken, he is bearded. Trim is short. He is Caucasian with an olive tone. Color of hair is brown, worn without a part. There is no sign of recession at either the temples or the crown. The patient appears healthy. I am in the company of Private Scott. The private arrived here at 12:10:00 hours.

  Nurse’s Exit Log, Patient #12

  Time: 12:51:00 Pulse Rate: 77 bpm Blood Pressure: 121/75

  Notes: The patient exited at 12:46:00 hours. His demeanor was calm. He spoke little during the course of treatment and showed no signs of anxiety. He requires no follow-up.

  Patient #12

  I was arranging the rolls of tape and washcloths on a table when the access code was rapped on the door. It startled both me and Private Scott, who was acting as my sentry. I looked at my watch to see it was a half hour earlier than the assigned time. The next sound I heard was the click of the safety on his weapon. As I looked at Private Scott, I could see that his finger was now on the trigger and his eyes locked onto mine. I reached down to my ankle and pulled out my weapon. After also flipping my safety to the off position, I gave him a nod. Private Scott unlocked the bolt to the door and stepped aside. The man behind it entered with the barrel of Private Scott’s M4 pointed to the side of his head, and the sight of my Ruger American 9mm aimed directly between his eyes. At first, I did not see his uniformed escorts. Then, they entered the room and stood beside the man. According to the protocol, I looked down at the table to ensure the picture on the cell phone screen matched the patient. When it did, I told the two soldiers they could take leave.

  The door was bolted shut again, and the man stood there waiting to be instructed. Though he was as thin as the rest of us, he wore it differently. He wore it like he had the strength of a hundred men. I looked at his eyes to see if they held the same resolve as his body. They were even more determined. More determined than any of the other patients I had previously serviced. And that worried me.

  “You may have a seat over here,” I said to him, patting a hand atop the examination table that was situated in the middle of the room where I was standing.

  He walked over and seated himself, folding his hands together and setting them between his knees. And while his demeanor seemed quite placid and he had purposely placed his hands in plain sight, I moved my working table back a few feet. One can never be certain down here. This is not a place to trust. It is a place to thank God every day. And it is a place to curse Him every night. But it is not a place to trust.

  “You’re early,” I said.

  “They dismiss at 1745. There would be no one there if I arrived here any later,” he replied.

  It was an answer he should not have given and words I should not have been privy to. And I was angry that I had been told. I was to be ignorant of any facts, like those of a firing squad are ignorant as to which one carries the actual bullet.

  “Then you should have told your commander,” I said.

  He did not have a reply to that, which seemed a little strange to me. I turned from him and continued with the prepping of the items on my table.

  “You’re the nurse?” he then asked.

  “Yes,” I said.

  “I expected a man.”

  “I am sorry to disappoint you.”

  “I am not disappointed. It is just what I expected.”

  I hoped that those were the last words he would speak. However, he continued on as if idle talk was the norm for an appointment such as this. I had no other choice but to engage him, though. Not doing so could agitate him. And that could have dire consequences. I wanted him to remain quiet like all the rest. I did not want to enter into any prolonged conversation. I did not want to get to know him. I never wanted to get to know any of them.

  “Please remove your shirt,” I then asked of him.

  He unbuttoned it with haste. Most who come here are hesitant. I gave a good look at his chest. The wounds were obvious. Gunshots, large caliber. Four I counted. From their location, I was surprised he was still alive. He set his shirt aside. I reached over to the table and dipped the cloth in my hand into a basin of water. When I turned back to him, he was pulling out a lighter and a rolled cigarette from his pocket. I dropped the cloth on the ground and quickly confiscated both. He rushed to grab my wrist. Not as if he was going to twist it in order to set the objects free, just to let me know he disapproved. Private Scott rushed over and jabbed him hard in the shoulder with the butt of his M4. It must have hurt like hell, but he didn’t show any of the pain. He just unfurled his fingers and withdrew his hand slowly, like that of a retreating cobra who had been warned by his handler.

  “If it was that important, you should have had one before you came,” I said to him sternly though I did not raise my voice.

  I took another cloth from the table, dipped it into the basin of water, and began cleansing his chest. The four bullet entries I washed over were like large countersunk holes and it made me squirm a bit. I felt like a mortician, a coroner, which if anything went wrong after he left, I suppose I was. I had begun washing his back when he spoke again.

  “Is this necessary?” he asked of me.

  “It is not. But it is part of the protocol,” I said truthfully.

  “How long have you been doing this?” he asked.

  “Almost as long as I have been here,” I answered.

  “And that has been how long?”

  “I am not certain. I do not count the days like the others.” It was the truth. I saw no reason at all to tally my misfortune. I took a towel and dried him off. He lowered his arms down. “Please leave them up. There is a garment I need to put on you first.”

  Over his head, I slipped the garment I had sewn myself the night before. It was crudely fashioned out of a rice sack. The hessian was a good first layer, resistant to moisture in case he started to sweat. This man though I could not envision perspiring.

  “I had a daughter,” he said as I was smoothing out the wrinkles. “Lily. Her name was Lily. What was your daughter’s name?”

  I froze for a moment in the question. I could feel my body wanting to shake. I could feel my hand wanting to reach out and slap him. Instead, I turned my back to him and began the final preparations at the table. He went on speaking.

  “We were in the foyer by the front door of our house. My wife had just finished fitting Lily’s little arm through the sleeve of her coat. She kissed Lily on top of the head and I then kissed her, my wife that is. You remember minutiae like that. You remember it after the fact. As if there was something in the details that could have been changed to change the outcome. But in all actuality, there was probably no sequence of events that could have changed anything that night. I could have been the one who fit Lily’s arm through the sleeve of her coat and kissed her on top of the head and the end result would have been the same. But an addled mind does not believe that events prior have no effect on the outcome. An addled mind holds on for years to the belief that if just something had been different, some small disturbance in the sequence, then the final outcome would have been different, much different than the one that occurred.”

  I wanted him to stop. I did not want to get to know him. I wanted him to remain anonymous to me like all of the others.

  “I was there with my daughter for a dance,” he continued. “It was a dance for only fathers and daught
ers. She had on her favorite princess dress, powder blue with white frills. Atop her head, she had on a silver tiara set with rhinestones. On her feet, shoes like slippers with a jewel on the front and a heel that lit up with every step she took. Over her hands, to her elbows, she wore long white gloves. I gave her permission to line her lips red, but just for that night. For that concession, she gave me a kiss on the cheek, and in turn I smiled so wide that into my mouth one could have fit the entire universe.”

  I lifted up the first vest from the table and turned back to face him. He already had his arms raised for me. The top four leather pockets were fitted with two TATP tubes apiece. On the back, the batteries, timer, and detonator were placed at the bottom. Above that, two pouches that I had filled with screws and ball bearings. I told him he would have to be careful now. I told him these are not as stable as we would like them to be. I told him if he bumped hard into something it could go off. He nodded and continued on.

  “Lily and I walked to the dance that night. We lived only eight blocks from the Catholic school she attended. It was a cold night. Bitterly cold, in fact. But beautiful. A light snow that could easily have been mistaken for confectionary sugar was falling all around us. There was no wind to speak of, but the clouds were moving fast through the sky, like a caravan of ghosts in a mad rush to a destination they only knew. The moon was a thief, so bright and full it seemed as if it had stolen all of the sun’s light once and for all. It was all so perfect. So perfect in fact that it must have pricked hell’s jealous rage.”

  I had just finished tying the straps at the sides of the vest into large bows. How ridiculous that I always tied large bows I thought when it wasn’t at all necessary. I was now performing a check of all the wired connections.

  “During our walk, Lily would intermittently release my hand and break out into a sprint. When she got far enough away, she would stop and look back. It was then I would come running up to her. And each time that I did, I would take her into my arms and lift her high up into the air, twirling her around and around. I remember thinking why does it have to be a dance. Why can’t I just leave work early every night and take her out for a walk? Why have I become a slave to a job that I do not even enjoy? My life. It is right here before me. It is right here in my arms.”

  I returned to the table and picked up the belt that I would strap around his midsection. In those leather pockets, I had packed nails. Some were three inches in length, others were five.

  “When we finally got to the school, I held the door open for her to enter. I always held the door open for Lily. I wanted her to know how she should be treated when she became a young woman. That she should not expect less from the man she was to love and marry. She did not walk right through this time. Instead, she pulled my hand away and closed the door. There she gave me instructions in the most gentle of ways, by bringing them forth in questions. She asked if it was okay if we did not dance together that night. She asked if it was possible that I did not come up to her while she was playing with her friends. I agreed to both requests and then opened the door for her again. She ran through it. I stood outside for a moment and looked over to the church that is connected to her school. It is a magnificent structure. A brick façade from the year 1910 with twin bell towers and a grand dome of white, modeled after St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome. A church that makes you believe in God. Atop stand twenty-six angels. At night, they are flooded in the brightest of light. I remember signing the cross. I remember thinking there must be a heaven. I remember thanking God for Lily.”

  “Too tight?” I asked. He shook his head like I knew he would. I could have tied it like a tourniquet and he still would have shaken his head.

  “The dance was in the basement gymnasium of the school. It was well decorated. Her mother had lent a hand that morning. Streamers and balloons adorned the side walls. Silver stars, snowflakes, and icicles hung from above. The floor was covered in glitter. It was magical. Magical not only for the children but also for the fathers who attended. As Lily had requested, I stood on a side of the gymnasium and kept out of her way. But I never let my eyes leave her. I was amazed at the way her other classmates were attracted to her as if she was some opposite pole of a magnet. She gathered all of her friends into a circle where they all began to dance. She directed everything. My little Lily, how little I really knew about her I thought.”

  “I have garments for you now,” I said to him. “You will need to remove your pants and shoes.”

  “Socks?” he asked.

  “It is up to you. Sometimes they wear them, sometimes they do not.”

  I walked off to another part of the room to where I had set the white pants, thobe, and sandals. He waited until I returned to undress. I know he waited so I wouldn’t miss a word.

  “I stood there for let’s say twenty minutes before one of the other fathers made an introduction. What we talked of I do not remember. His name was Uwe. That I do remember. It’s an easy name not to forget. I was wondering if he was German. He looked German. As he was talking, I heard the sound of the doors closing to the entrance. It was faint over the music playing but quite unmistakable as they are large and heavy doors. When I turned my head, I could see five or six of them. I knew immediately who they were. They were all in black with their signature scarves around their necks and balaclavas hiding their faces. This had not been their first event. They had already struck in a few cities during the year. Isolated incidents we were told so as not to alarm us.

  “They screamed ‘Allahu akbar’ and then began firing randomly with their automatic weapons. Uwe was one of the first. The bullet buried itself into his head mid-sentence. Strangely though, he was able to finish his thought. I found that odd. Odd, but I suppose logical. The brain has already released the words and the mouth is still forming them when the bullet pierces the skull, enters the cerebral cortex, and then exits. So, why shouldn’t his last words have been completed? ‘Who are those people?’ he had asked. It was a fortunate shot. Fortunate for both. Fortunate for the gunman that his random aim immediately found a victim and fortunate for Uwe that he did not see his daughter cut down in mid-stride as she came running over. Anyway, I ran for my Lily as Uwe expired. In the mayhem, I was pushing aside other children as they screamed, some of who fell to the floor. I am not proud of that. It haunts me to this day. But what other option was left for me.”

  He paused for a moment, looking into my eyes. I suppose he was looking for forgiveness. I’m not sure I gave it to him. I am not sure what my eyes returned. He continued.

  “When I reached Lily, she had already dropped to the floor and was curled into a ball, her little white-gloved hands over her ears. I covered her with my body and then put a hand over her mouth. If asked, I could not say how long we lay there in terror. A minute, two minutes, eternity. All are the same interval of time in a moment such as that. The bullets now were being fired in short intervals. I knew they were executing people. No longer was it random. The footsteps. That is what you are tuned into at that moment. You are waiting for your turn. You are wondering if you can cheat death. You are praying to God, promising Him your soul and selling all future options on your life. One of them was over us now. Though my eyes were closed, I could hear him breathing, the exhalations of a beast. Lily squirmed for a moment, unaware. I had no other choice. I hurried myself up to reach for his weapon. He fired four times into my body. All of them felt like I had been struck with a sledgehammer. I was instantly propelled backward. I could feel the squeeze on one of my lungs and each breath I took after was excruciating. I was face up, staring at the ceiling when what seemed to be a white cloud quickly erased all that I was looking at.”

  I saw him teeter a bit as if those shots had entered his body again. I reached out and steadied his body, afterward easing him back to a sitting position on the edge of the examination table. I could not have him fall. I was soon enough though to find out that it was not the bullets that had caused him to falter.

  “I awoke in a hospita
l bed one week later. It was the dead of night. The morphine drip into my vein belied the corporeal damage that had been inflicted. Immediately I unplugged myself from the machines and made it into the hall before collapsing. Two days later, I awoke again. My father was to the side of me in a chair. At the door, my wife’s father. One knows instantly when deaths are about to be announced. My father-in-law told me my wife had died. I asked how. He said she had taken a bottle of vodka along with a bottle of drain opener. An agonizing end that I know she wanted it to be. When he left, I turned to my father to ask of Lily. He said she had passed in the gymnasium.”

  He then reached out and grabbed my hand so hard that I could hear the bones of my fingers crack.

  “You understand, it is not that I was weaker than her mother. It is not that I wanted to keep on living. It is just that I craved revenge more than I craved death. And vengeance, above even love and hate, is the most powerful of all desires. It is the opiate for the body and mind when they have lost all will to keep moving forward. And that revenge I only partially satiated. A few weeks after the attack, four of them were killed in a street battle in the middle of Lake Shore Drive. The other one they captured and put on trial. He did not make it that far. I shot him as he entered the court. I was tried and convicted. Two years I spent in jail before the invasion. When chaos reigned, the jail was abandoned and I fled. Now, I am here before you.”