by L. T. Ryan
The sound did not interrupt them. They continued playing, each expressing their own facial tics and emotions with every successful slaying of a zombie or vampire or whatever they were supposed to be.
Zombies dragged their feet, Addison reminded herself.
She cleared her throat again. When the gesture went unnoticed, she spoke up. “Hey, assholes.”
The guy looked over, smiled and jutted his chin in her direction. A few seconds later, Carla let out a loud sigh, did something to her controller that paused the game, and then looked over. Addison’s stare was met with an eye roll.
“What do you want, Addy?” Carla said.
Addison hated being called Addy. Her mother named her Addison, and that was what everyone should call her. “I’ve told you not to call me Addy. And what the hell do you two think you’re doing in here?” She gestured toward the bong and the television.
“It’s called unwinding,” Carla said. “Something you need to learn how to do so you’ll be less bitchy all the time.”
Addison stretched her finger out and then snatched them back, clutching them tight. A few of her knuckles popped when she did this. The guy on the couch let out some kind of snort or laugh and nodded his approval. This time Addison rolled her eyes.
“It’s not even seven in the morning,” she said. “Some of us have to be up for stuff that actually takes place during the morning. If you need to unwind, fine, but you can do so without waking up the entire complex.”
Carla set her controller down between her and the guy, leaned forward and grabbed the bong and lighter. She brought the open end of the pipe to her mouth, and then flicked the lighter, holding it close to the stem where a few buds had been placed. As she drew in a deep breath, the flame arched over and lit up the tiny bundle of marijuana, causing it to burn bright red. The water in the bong bubbled, and cool smoke slithered up the chamber and into Carla’s mouth.
How the woman held that much smoke in her lungs baffled Addison.
As Carla sat there looking like a frat boy about to barf, she passed the bong over to her male companion, who repeated the process.
“You guys are fucking idiots,” Addison said.
Carla coughed, forcing the smoke from her lungs. She exhaled as hard as she could, blowing recycled smoke in Addison’s direction. “You want some of this?” she said in a voice two octaves deeper than normal.
Addison stood there, shaking her head. For a moment, she thought about lunging forward and attacking the woman. As high as Carla was, Addison figured she could reel off four or five punches before her roommate managed to react. The guy was so baked he’d do nothing, most likely. She could probably even land a few shots on him. He wouldn’t even notice. She smiled as the scenario played out in her mind. She didn’t attack, though.
Instead, she took a deep breath, closed her eyes and counted backward from twenty. Then, she said, “What I’d like is for you two to keep it down for a couple hours so I can get a little more sleep. Can you do that?”
Carla’s face darkened. Addison found herself grateful that the guy held onto the glass bong. Otherwise, her roommate might try to use it as a weapon. After a few more minutes, Carla broke off the stare and looked at the frozen image on the television screen. Finally, she spoke.
“Okay, we’ll keep it down.”
Addison smiled, then backed up a foot, and then sidestepped down the hall until she was out of view. She didn’t trust either of them enough to turn her back on the couple. After she closed the door to her room, she flipped the lock up and tested it herself. Satisfied her crazy roommate couldn’t get in without a bit of effort, something Carla was wont to do, Addison collapsed on her bed and closed her eyes.
It was too late, though. The anger combined with four hours of sleep turned out to be enough to keep her awake. For thirty minutes she kept her eyelids clenched shut, trying to will herself into unconsciousness. Finally, she gave up, grabbed her phone, navigated to a reading app and resumed the novel she’d started reading the day before, King’s of Cool.
Best opening line ever, she thought.
After two hours, she estimated herself to be two-thirds of the way through the book and decided to get out of bed. Sleep would have been nice, but at least it had been quiet. She felt relaxed. Unsure whether the guy was still out there, she plucked the thin flannel off the back of her computer chair and put it on. The soundtrack from the video game met her as she opened her door. She crept down the hall. Carla and the guy were asleep on the couch. Their heads rested at opposite ends on the arms of the couch, and their feet mingled in the middle. They’d left the game on the menu screen, where it looped the same guitar riff every thirty seconds.
Addison moved past them and went into the kitchen. She reached up and grabbed a plastic single-serve coffee container and a mug. She rooted through the fridge while she waited for the coffee maker to warm up. The refrigerator was divided in two halves, hers and Carla’s. On Carla’s side the milk was expired, the egg carton was empty and the fruit was moldy. It made everything smell like garbage. Addison knew this and had taken a big gulp of air in advance. Running out of stamina, she reached in and grabbed an apple then closed the door.
A few moments later, she sat at the table with a fresh mug of coffee and her breakfast. Though the caffeine would further wake her up, the warm steam that wrapped around her chin and cheeks caused her to long for more sleep. The only way to counteract that was to drink. So she did. And as she sipped on her coffee and ate her apple, she used her phone to check her email and then Facebook.
An alarming trend caused her stomach to turn. Several news feeds she glanced at mentioned an event occurring in Africa. She opened up the web browser on her phone and went to the first news site she could think of. Though the pictures were small, they intensified the feeling in her gut.
She got up, walked around the couch and stopped in front of the coffee table. She started moving magazines, empty food containers, plastic bags and the purple bong. She found the universal remote and tuned the television to the cable box. The local station broadcast a national news feed. On the television were images that might have been cut from the game Carla and her friend had been playing.
Minus the chainsaws.
The footage was shaky at best. It looked like someone using a cell phone had shot it. A little banner on the top said Tangier, Morocco. People, or what looked like people, shuffled along a dirty street. One of them fell and the others kept going, trampling over the person. None of them stopped to help. She saw a group of them split off and descend upon another person standing off to the side. He didn’t look like the others. In fact, he looked rather normal. At least, he did until they tore him apart limb from limb. Two from the group remained behind to feast on his body.
Addison sat down on the coffee table. Her left butt cheek grew cold and wet. She had no idea what the liquid under her was, and she didn’t care. The image on the TV shrunk to about a quarter of its original size and a reporter behind a desk appeared.
“Again, these images are being broadcast live from Tangier, Morocco. We apologize in advance for the graphic and disturbing nature of what was just shown. Information is starting to come out, but reports are conflicting. Stay tuned to this channel for updates as we receive them.”
Addison grabbed the remote and hit the pause button. “Carla, wake up.”
Carla moaned and rolled over.
“Carla,” Addison said again.
Carla kicked her legs like a stubborn child, hitting the guy in the groin. He tried to yell, but a hollow sound came out of his twisted mouth.
“Carla!” Addison screamed.
“What?” Carla screamed back.
“Open your damn eyes and look.” As soon as the woman cracked her eyes open and directed her gaze toward the television, Addison rewound the feed and hit play. She didn’t look at the footage, instead focusing on Carla’s reaction. Tears streamed down the woman’s face as she watched what Addison knew was the man being torn to
pieces, and then eaten.
“What the frig is going on?” Carla asked.
Addison shook her head and rose. “I don’t know, but it doesn’t look good.”
Two
Kathy Ryder swiped her finger across her cell phone’s screen and clicked on the smiley face icon. She scrolled through the contact list until she reached her husband’s name.
Sean.
She pressed the green phone icon and held the phone to her ear. She received the same results she had a few minutes prior, a fast-busy signal. Once had frustrated her. Twice had left her annoyed. But this was the tenth time her call had failed to complete.
It was luck that she had seen the report since she normally did not watch morning programming. The bathroom in her hotel room had a flat-panel TV built into the mirror. She had flipped it on while brushing her teeth, and had left it tuned to a local station while she put on her makeup. She didn’t pay all that much attention to the broadcast. It was background noise.
After she’d finished applying her makeup, she switched off the lights and left the bathroom. She had nearly left her hotel room when she remembered the TV. As she reached for the power button, the breaking news banner flashed on the screen. The shaky reporter caught her attention. The disturbing images caught her off guard. She turned and vomited into the toilet. She figured most people had a similar reaction.
The report shocked her to her core. The things that she had heard her husband muttering in his sleep over the past eight years now played out before her. She tried calling him the first time after the report. She could deal with not reaching him as long as she could leave a message. But not being able to get the phone to ring at all left her feeling harried.
Instead of going to the conference, she left the hotel and raced to the airport. She tried to convince her companions to return with her, but they all refused. She couldn’t go into detail about what she had seen on the television. The words weren’t there. This left her wracked with guilt as she navigated through the loose traffic heading toward the airport.
From all appearances, she’d beaten the rush. She tried to book a flight at traffic lights, but her phone could not access the internet. She figured it had to be related to the inability to make a call out.
After she reached the airport, there was no wait to turn in her rental car. The man at the counter told her there would be a shuttle by in a few minutes. Kathy declined and decided to walk to the terminal. It wasn’t far, maybe an eighth of a mile. Traffic outside of the airport seemed normal, although she didn’t spend enough time in Seattle to tell with certainty.
Why weren’t people panicking? Why was there no mad rush at the airport? Where were the people who needed to get back home to their families?
The only thing she could figure was that perhaps the radio stations hadn’t picked up the news yet. In her haste to get here, she hadn’t bothered to turn the car’s radio on, so she couldn’t verify that.
Inside, she found no wait at the Delta ticketing counter. A cheerful blond woman greeted her and asked how she could help. Did she not know about the events that had transpired earlier halfway around the world? It looked like everyone in the place remained blissfully unaware. Kathy faced a moral dilemma. Say something and she might not get home. Say nothing and she would condemn anyone she came into contact with. For the time being, she had to choose the latter.
There was no easy route back to Roanoke, Virginia, it seemed. They had flown non-stop to Seattle, but only because she and her companions had driven to Washington, D.C. for their flight. To get closer to home, her itinerary required two layovers. The first would be in Chicago for an hour, and the second in Cincinnati for close to two. From there, she’d take a commuter flight to Roanoke, placing her fifteen miles from her doorstep. The trip was scheduled to last eight hours. She glanced at her watch and performed the time conversion in her head. It would be dark by the time she opened her front door.
The wait at the security checkpoint was minimal. Kathy passed through without incident. Ten minutes later she found her gate and took a seat in an empty row next to a huge window overlooking a runway. One by one, planes took off with no more than a thirty-second delay. In forty-five minutes, her plane would lift off and begin its journey to Chicago.
It had to, she told herself.
Even if she couldn’t continue on from there, Illinois was a hell of a lot closer to home than Washington state.
Slowly, the seats around her were filled by other travelers. Some were dressed in suits, perhaps setting off for a day of negotiations and meetings and conferences. Others were dressed more casually, maybe making a trip to visit family, or to return home, or for any myriad of reasons.
Would any of them make it to their destinations? And if so, what waited for them there?
She pulled out her cell phone and tried to place a call. Again, she received a fast busy tone. When would they get the lines fixed?
She glanced around, noticing that nobody held a phone to their heads. Nor were people slouched over, tapping away at their screens. Everyone was affected by the same issue. Judging by the looks on their faces, only a few seemed to know why. Kathy figured that was because most people got their news from their phones these days, not the TV or the radio. The majority of them would have listened to music from their personal library stored in their cell phone’s memory, or their MP3 player on the way to the airport.
Who wanted to deal with commercials?
She looked up at the four flat screen televisions mounted to the thick columns close to the middle aisle. Two of them were off. The other two were tuned to a closed loop broadcast. They displayed threat assessment information, and then travel tips.
She wondered if whoever ran the airport knew about the reports. They purposefully weren’t showing the information because they didn’t want pandemonium to break out in the terminal. Under normal circumstances, Kathy would brush such thoughts aside and label them as conspiracy theories. But the images from earlier lingered. She could not shake free of them. She assumed that most who saw them felt the same way.
She tried to call Sean one more time, figuring it would be her last attempt before landing in Chicago. To her surprise, the phone rang twice, but then cut off. She pressed the green phone icon again, hoping to hear the line ring. It didn’t, though. Instead, fast busy tones greeted her.
Kathy moved quickly to get to the front of the line when it came time to board. Everyone appeared calm. Sooner or later that would change. Once news spread, the panic would begin. She knew that could happen at any moment, and in no way, shape, or form would she allow herself to be thwarted by it.
She sat down in her seat as if she were staking a claim along a river known for strong gold flows. Half the people who passed by made eye contact with her. Half of those people actually smiled or nodded. One particularly obese man stopped in the aisle in front of her. Dread filled her as she prepared for the man to take a seat next to her. He coughed, craned his head, and then moved one row further back and squeezed in behind her. Her seat pushed forward, and then fell back.
As she clutched her carry-on bag, she realized that she had left her luggage at the hotel. A panicked chill passed through her body. She resolved herself that there was nothing she could do about it. When she landed, she’d try one of her co-workers and ask them to retrieve her bag for her when they left the hotel.
If they left.
She pushed the thought from her mind.
Kathy and the other passengers settled in for takeoff as the plane began to taxi. They came to a stop and the captain spoke.
“Folks, this is Captain Steinberger. It looks like our takeoff is going to be delayed.”
That was it. He gave no estimated time limit. He offered no apology.
A new form of panic set in as Kathy’s worst fears took root. Things had escalated further and faster than they had mentioned on television. Now, she and a hundred or so other souls were trapped inside a seven-forty-seven, bound for Chicago, now on a o
ne-way trip to hell. She clutched her bag tight to her chest. The seats to her right and left were both empty. She found herself wishing someone had sat next to her. At least then she would have some emotional support.
Captain Steinberger continued, “We were supposed to be next in line, but we’ve just been informed that there are ten planes in front of us. So sit tight for another ten minutes and then we’ll be on our way to Chicago.”
Kathy exhaled a ragged breath as the sweat that covered her forehead felt like it turned to ice.
Just get me home, she thought. Please, get me back to Sean and Emma.
Three
Sean reached down and ensured that his pistol remained secure under his seat. Emma seemed to be shaken, and he feared that if she saw his handgun, she’d grow more distraught. He knew that she was aware he had the M9, a relic from his days as an Air Force PJ. And his hunting rifles were in plain view, albeit locked up. But if she saw the weapon now, in the midst of this crisis, she might realize how grave of a situation they faced.
“What’s going on, Dad?” she asked a second time.
He didn’t respond.
Cars formed an intricate puzzle around them. He had to find a way out since someone had blocked off his escape route.
“Dad? People were saying there’s a nuclear attack happening.”
Sean shook his head.
“David said he heard that an EMP had been detonated over Chicago. Do you know what that means?”
He did, but he decided against telling her.
“He told me that means everything will stop working. Planes, cars, even electricity.”
“Only some cars,” he said. “Older cars, ones without fancy electronic controlled engines, will work fine.”
“So that’s what it is then? An EMP?”
Sean ignored the question. He saw an opening wide enough for his truck, and he took it. A white mini-van backed into his rear passenger fender, causing his vehicle to jerk to the right. He kept going, managing to narrowly avoid hitting a woman carrying a baby.