Pain

by Harry Shannon

  “No, honey, for real, I’m getting kind of grossed out.”

  “So don’t look.”

  “It stinks in here.”

  “Hold your breath.”

  He turned her around roughly, positioned her facing the wall, yanked down her panties and entered her from behind.

  ««—»»

  Doc could hear the movement outside and all around. Heard voices whispering upstairs. He knew the infected were getting active again. Frantic, he crawled down the hall, saw the empty spot by the back door. For the first time that long evening he felt like giving up. Just sobbing.

  “Kid?” Doc whispered. “Champ?”

  He saw the hole in the window boards, moonlight feathering through the slats. Could tell the infected right outside the door, unlike many others stirring outside and around the ER, had gone back into a comatose state, and posed no immediate threat.

  What’s happened to the girl?

  Something moved behind him. Doc licked his lips. He went flat again, turned around slowly and used his flashlight to explore back where he’d just been. Boxes and crates broken open, dead bodies everywhere. Theresa, lying still at last. The floor, a widening puddle of blood. Doc saw the white curtain twitch. He moved the beam down and spotted some shoes. The feet moved. A female form emerged from the flowing white curtains. Some kind of a nun. Eyes glaring, she fumbled a bit, still tangled in the white curtain. She was definitely waking up.

  And she had a gun.

  The nun moaned softly. Looked around. Doc closed his eyes. Boffo was dead, Callie missing, Theresa sprawled on the floor, half covered by the other curtain. Timothy was dead. Doc saw Bowden bent over the laptop, still working on a rescue. Doc’s heart continued to sink. Perhaps their situation was hopeless. He told himself to call out, to warn Bowden, but the thought was overwhelmed by his concern for Champ. Had they grabbed the kid, taken her outside?

  Down the hall, the armed nun turned her head. Looked back towards the hallway. She spotted Bowden bent over the laptop, waiting for a response to his last text, and heard as Bowden swore under his breath. Still no response. He became aware of something just out of the corner of his eye, like a shadow moving beside and then behind him. Someone that kept moving closer. He turned. Bowden was face to face with the nun. Her eyes burned with agony, her features were contorted. She had blood in her mouth from chewing her lower lip. Bowden rolled his chair back desperately and then she raised the gun.

  ««—»»

  Maddening darkness. Things that go bump and rustle in the night, from small juicy ones on feathery legs to large ones with yellowing teeth. Only one little patch of light, coming from a handheld device. No sound but a thudding heartbeat and the faint, repetitive, highly annoying music coming from her phone.

  Then suddenly a bit of light. Champ used the flashlight to get a sense of her surroundings. The crawl space was low, filthy and filled with spider webs and rat nests. Nothing down here but some pipes and a few vents for trapped air. She could hear footsteps above her, moans now and again. A slow but steady increase in activity as the creatures woke up for what would probably be the last time. She flicked the light off again and wondered if it would be visible from above, through the floorboards. Champ did not want to attract any attention. Still, she needed a way out of here. She’d already begun to feel claustrophobic, and could not imagine being forced to spend the rest of the night in this oversized coffin. She risked another two seconds with the flashlight, explored 360 degrees.

  The same everywhere. She was clearly near the middle of the building itself. Not much head room, just low wooden beams and cobwebs and bugs and piles of rat shit everywhere. Filth, trash and dust.

  The sound of faint music came again. Champ jerked and dropped the flashlight as it finally hit her. The cell phone was ringing! She opened it clumsily. It indicated a Skype call from an unknown sender that needed to be accepted, so Champ accepted and whispered. “Hello? Hello?”

  Champ could not believe her eyes. A pretty woman in uniform appeared on the tiny screen. The background was greenish and far away, as if the woman sat in a military tent of some kind. She wore a headset and leaned close, speaking in an almost identical whisper. Someone had found them!

  “This is Major Davidson,” the woman said. “Who am I speaking to?”

  “Thank God. Thank God. I’m so scared. I think I’m the last one left. My name is Julie. Can you help me, Major?”

  “I’m going to do my best.”

  Champ saw Leanne look away, as if locating another person far away or outside the tent. Oddly, it was almost as if she didn’t wish to be overheard.

  “Major isn’t my name, Julie. Call me Leanne.”

  “Then you call me Champ.”

  Champ was crying softly. The small face on the screen was that of an angel, and Champ had never seen anyone so beautiful and so powerful in her life. She couldn’t take her eyes off the image.

  Leanne said, “That’s the spirit. Champ. You’re on a handheld device with a cell phone, right? How are the batteries?”

  “I don’t know, Okay, I guess.

  Someone in or around the tent moved, and Champ saw Leanne flinch and lean back. What’s going on? She doesn’t seem to want the others to know she found me? What does that mean?

  As if addressing her concerns, Leanne whispered, “Listen up, things are messy around here. So I may have to hop off once in a while, but if I do I’ll be back. Now, whatever you do, do not break this connection. I need you to be brave okay?

  “Sure.” Champ stiffened as she heard a small creature hustle through the darkness. She dropped her attitude “Ah, screw the macho shit. I’m really scared.”

  “I know,” Leanne said. “I can imagine. But you’ve got to keep it together. Now tell me exactly where you are.”

  The rat, or whatever it was, moved again. And someone thumped on a board near her head. Champ whimpered. “Below the ER. In a crawl space.”

  “Is anyone else with you?”

  “I… I think they’re all dead.”

  Leanne reacted to something off camera again. She looked like she was busily covering something up, rearranging her desk. She said, “Hang tough. I’m going to find a way to get you out.”

  “Promise?”

  And Leanne whispered so softly Champ almost missed her words. She said, “I’ll be back.”

  “Wait!”

  But the screen went dark. Champ was all alone again. The rustling sound seemed closer now. So did the footsteps on the floor above. Champ didn’t dare move, cry out or use her flashlight. What felt like a large rat ran over her calf. Champ twitched and banged her head on a low beam. She trembled and allowed herself a good, long cry. She edged back away from that spot, figuring she’d gotten too close to some creature’s nest. A moment later, Champ used the flashlight briefly. She was now in some kind of corner by plumbing pipes.

  Her heart kicked. She’d found a small opening covered by wire mesh.

  Champ turned the flashlight off again and allowed her eyes to adjust to the darkness. There was enough moonlight to make out shapes in the yard. Trees, a couple of vehicles, the big truck, a garage. She wondered if the power tools likely to be found there could be useful as defensive weapons. Champ touched the wire, felt it move a bit. The screen was designed to pop out so workers could get under the building. She froze.

  Movement on the grass outside, a shadow fell and shoes appeared… Uh oh. Legs now standing right outside. So several more infected were right there in the front yard.

  Champ wriggled back a few feet, tucked the phone under her blouse to muffle it when it rang the next time. Something to tell Major Leanne. She had a way out, but timing would be everything.

  ««—»»

  “Ow. Cramp in my leg.” Billy Ray and Callie were going at it but trying not to make too much noise. He was still behind her, really into it, but getting tired. It had been a long day after all. He pulled out, shifted his position a bit. Callie was panting “I’m such a dirty girl
. I’m so bad.” She had her eyes closed tightly and her face pressed down into the perfumed hair on her arm to avoid having to smell the stench in the room. She was nearing orgasm. “Don’t. Stop. Now.”

  The whole idea was so perverse, so corrupted, it gave Billy Ray a second wind, and he rapidly resumed the doggy style copulation. They were both far too busy to see what was happening at the window behind them. Some of the infected who’d been sleeping on the roof had come awake. A white-haired man in a black suit was sneaking in through the attic window. A tall preacher carrying a worn Bible. Billy Ray and Callie kept screwing. The preacher watched them go at it, perhaps with an air of envy. He quietly set the Bible down.

  Billy Ray whimpered.

  Callie cried, “No, not yet!”

  Billy Ray tried to keep pumping. He wobbled. He felt his neck with one hand. Found that his throat was yawning open, blood pouring out. Puzzled, Billy Ray stopped moving. The world began to go dim. A hand grabbed the hair on his head, yanked hard. Billy Ray watched the attic tilt to a crazy angle as his brain continued to function but his decapitation was complete.

  Callie felt him stop. She hid her annoyance. Made her voice bright. “Honey?”

  No answer. She turned her head, and gasped in horror at what had been mounting her. Callie broke free of the twitching corpse, scrambled away, covered with blood, and finally spotted the infected Preacher Man holding the severed head of her lover. Billy Ray’s torso slipped to the ground. Callie fully realized what was happening. Eyes wide. Mind gone. She began to shriek.

  The preacher beat on her head with the Bible. Hard. Again. Callie stopped screaming. He kept hitting her. Callie resisted at first but was soon too dazed to fight back. Something seemed right about it. She welcomed the pain. The preacher beat her unconscious with the Holy Word. Then he got busy with his butcher knife.

  ««—»»

  Bowden reacted to a high scream from above, up in the attic. He snapped out of his stupor. Looked around. It was so difficult to concentrate with the wounds, the faint light, the dust in the air that seemed to be filled with narcotics of various kinds. Bowden felt sluggish and weak. He turned to his left and saw a strange sight, the nun closing in on him from behind. She raised a weapon, a small handgun.

  Bowden finally managed to react. He got to his feet, stumbled a few steps away from the computer just as she fired. BAM! The nun blew a hole in the computer screen. She studied the damage as if impressed and excited by the gun. While her attention was diverted, Bowden hit her with the chair. The nun fell backwards.

  Yards away in the dark, Doc focused at the sound of the shot. He shook off his grief. He’d just choose to believe Champ had escaped rather than been taken. That hope was all he had left. Down the hall he could see the nun who’d shot Bowden, but were they too far away for him to help out? Doc grabbed the last syringe full of bleach. He sprinted down the hall to try to help Bowden.

  By the stairs, Bowden and the nun struggled. He punched her in the face, but she was supernaturally strong and far angrier. Bowden felt weak from loss of blood. He used his right palm and tried to drive her nose bone up into her forehead to kill her. She turned her head and he missed, perhaps broke a cheekbone at best. The gun went off, and Bowden cringed. He’d been wounded yet again. Bowden dropped to his knees, then fell sideways and rolled on his back, moaning.

  The nun leaned down over Bowden and held her gun to his mouth. Her eyes were vacant but she seemed mildly curious to see the mess she was about to make of his head. Bowden said his prayers. Doc appeared behind her. The nun grunted as he stabbed her in the neck with the syringe full of bleach. Bowden watched her die. Watched Doc as he grimly forced every bit of the poison into her veins.

  The nun trembled. She did an odd little dance, spun in a circle. Bowden tried to call out a warning, because sure as shit the gun went off again and this time it was Doc who got wounded.

  Doc said, “Ah, crap.”

  The nun dropped dead, having caused enough damage for one night. Doc went down on one knee, clutching his side. He checked the wound; as best he could make out the bullet had gone through flesh. He pressed hard to slow the bleeding. He and Bowden exchanged glances. We are so fucked.

  11:12 PM

  In the attic, Callie and Billy Ray, half naked and dead as Custer’s nuts. The infected preacher picked up his bloody Bible, stepped over the bodies, started down the stairs. His absence seemed to call others into the room; more and more of the infected started coming in after him, through the open attic window. The cool evening breeze stank of rot and pus.

  Doc heard footsteps coming down the stairs from the attic. They’d heard screams. The clumsy gait told him this wasn’t a rescue party. He wearily swung his gaze back to the other side. The back door. A board was punched in, another pried off, both fell to the floor with a clatter. More coming from that direction as well.

  Doc estimated the distances involved and came to a decision. He whispered, “Bowden? I’ll take my chances. You get to the waiting room. Now!”

  Bowden forced himself to move and made it to the waiting room on knees and elbows. Meanwhile, Doc crawled towards trash piled in the corner. He went into the smashed cardboard drug boxes, just his lower legs extended. Bowden felt his heart sink as Doc seemed to tremble and then stop moving. Perhaps he was faking it. Or perhaps he was dying. “Jesus!”

  In the lobby, Cap almost shot Bowden when he appeared in the doorway. Bowden was bleeding and pretty torn up. Cap thought he looked like twenty miles of bad road. Bowden moved to the side and eased the door closed. A dead arm kept it from closing all the way. Bowden pushed it out of the space and closed and locked the door. Cap just waited by the barred window.

  “Sit rep?”

  Bowden barely made it to his knees. “Still no contact. Others dead.”

  “All of them? Are you sure?”Bowden nodded weakly. “Don’t see how any of them made it, and if they did it won’t be long now.” He wedged a chair under the doorknob. Tried to push some furniture in front of the door as well, but he was too far gone. He sat down, exhausted.

  “Man, I’m tired. We’re fucked, aren’t we? No ammo, no backup, no chopper.”

  Cap seemed to come to a decision. To Bowden’s shock, he whipped out a small communicator attached to his vest. “It’s me. ETA?”

  Bowden blinked. “Where did you get that thing? What the…?”

  Cap said, “Jesus, isn’t that cutting it pretty close? Okay, okay.”As Bowden stared, Cap suddenly produced an extra clip for his 9mm automatic.

  He’s obviously been hiding ammunition from the rest of us all along too.Why? And who is he talking to?

  “Okay, 11:50. In the yard.” Cap glanced at Bowden. “Two of us. Out.”

  Cap closed the communicator. He checked his wristwatch. It was now 11:32. Although Bowden didn’t know it, only twenty-eight minutes to go before an air strike leveled the place and removed all evidence.

  Bowden looked shocked as he coughed up blood. He caught on at last. “Cap, you slick bastard. Cut a deal behind our back?”

  Cap shrugged. “Hey. You snooze, you lose.”

  “To sell the PAIN virus?” Cap took the vial out of his vest pocket and waved it around mockingly.

  “Okay. Who’s buying? CIA?”

  Cap shook his head slightly.

  Bowden said, “No. Jesus, Cap, you didn’t.”

  “Fuck ‘em all. Already got a fat deposit from the VP, but an even better purchase price from The Sons of Allah.”

  “No.”

  Cap slid across the floor on his butt and put an arm around Bowden. “Nothing personal. Just business, bro. It’s the American way. You’re coming with me, partners all the way, just like I promised.”

  Bowden coughed up blood again. “Can’t…”

  “Can’t what?”

  “No. Can’t let you.”

  Cap thought for a long moment. A touch of genuine sadness passed over his face. He checked his watch again. “Ah, shit. You always were a boy scout.”<
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  Cap suddenly covered Bowden’s mouth and nose, cutting off his friend’s air supply. Bowden reacted, struggled to breathe. His wounds promptly gushed more precious blood. Cap held on tight, kept repeating shhh shhh shhh as if to a small child. Bowden arched his back and his boot heels drummed the floor. He slumped down exhausted. Cap flinched a bit when Bowden whimpered, weakened. Died. When Cap was sure, he lay his friend out flat on the floor. Bowden kept staring at him with bloodshot eyes, so Cap covered Bowden’s face with a throw pillow from the couch.

  He crawled away. Listened for a moment. They were moving around all over the building. This was going to take some doing. He was all alone.

  Cap opened the communicator.

  “Scratch that. It’s just me now. This is going to be tight. Move your ass.”

  He closed the device, sat back to wait. He kept his eyes closed, even when he heard the low thumping coming from the hallway as some of the infected tried to open the inner door. In through the nose, out through the mouth didn’t work because of the stench. So he breathed through his mouth as slowly as possible. The clock was ticking.

  ««—»»

  Down in the crawl space, Champ was playing with the wire mesh. The inflected man had moved a few feet away and was standing near the front porch. She felt safe enough to experiment. It was designed to pop out. She loosened it easily, almost let it slip from her fingers but put it back in place quietly. When the time came, she now knew should could get free. But where was Leanne? Why hadn’t she called again? Champ looked through the wire at the cars parked so tantalizingly close, but yet so far away. But if she did get there and hot wire one, who the hell would drive?

  …Doc was under the boxes, legs extended into the room, still not moving. Some of the infected were sitting leaning against the wall, all of them covered with the drug power. It seemed to comfort them, perhaps it dulled their agony. One fat garage mechanic sat down heavily on the floor. Played with the contents of a broken bottle. He shook out some pills and chewed them with a look of satisfaction. This was going on everywhere. Others were laying down rubbing their gums. Snorting powder. Getting stoned one way or another. Grinning. Starting to nod off. They all looked pretty relaxed, actually. For the infected, anyway.