“He wasn’t revived. He was just hungry.”
“Where is he now?” James asked.
“At the field hospital and is fine,” Tom replied. “He wasn’t dead. He wasn’t revived. He was being held by his mother. She was a revived.”
Ella held up her hand. ‘Wait. She revived and the baby wasn’t bit or eaten?”
Tom shook his head. “No. And she pretty much handed him right to me. She was trying to care for him. When I looked at her, I thought about June. I thought, what if she knows? What if she just can’t voice it? I mean, she cared for the baby. I looked at her and thought of June. I couldn’t pull the trigger.”
“Why am I here?” James asked. “How is she now?”
“I don’t know,” Tom replied. “I injected her, she dropped and I ran to get you. I’m not allowed to do that and I thought you could help me figure out if it is working, or if I should just rectify.”
“It can’t work,” Ella said. “They decompose.”
“Not fast,” Tom said. “Not for at least two weeks then it speeds up. Can you doc, can you just take a look at her? Tell me you see what June has been talking about and tell me if you think the cure can work.”
“Yes, I can do that. Open the door,” James said.
Tom nodded and turned the knob, leading James and Ella inside. “She’s in the back room. Once we get back there. Stay back in case she is no longer docile. That way I can …” He quit talking when he heard a scuffling sound. Like feet shuffling on the floor. He lifted his weapon.
Rhonda stepped slowly from the small kitchen. She moved stiff and with a limp. She stopped and looked at Tom. “Where’s my baby?”
“In answer to your question,” James whispered to Tom. “It worked.”
<><><><>
It made the typical ripping sound when James removed the blood pressure cuff from Rhonda. “Sixty over forty. Low. Not impressive, but better than being too low to register, which is probably where you were.”
He had also physically examined her, finding her heart rate low. Her skin was still pale, eyes not quite back to normal color, but the blood was gone. The arm where she was scratched was still discolored and he found necrosis on her legs. Something they’d deal with later if she survived. James wasn’t sold on it being permanent.
“How do you feel?” he asked her.
“Better. Weak. The pain was horrendous. I felt like everything was on fire.” She then looked at Tom. “Thank you. Thank you for seeing it. I tried to talk. I couldn’t. In my mind I was saying to you, help me, I’m still in here. Thank God you saw it.”
Tom nodded in a humble way.
“What now?” Rhonda asked.
“I’m cautiously optimistic,” James replied. “But this is all new. This cure. I mean we had to pause the vaccine. It was causing severe side effects.”
Ella asked. “What kind?”
James shrugged. “They were specific. Can’t be that bad if they’re expecting to resume in a couple days.” He stood. “However, I do know, giving the cure to a revived is strictly prohibited. You still look rather …”
“Dead?” Rhonda guess.
“Yeah. You need fluids if we can even get an IV line in your vein. Perhaps some protein, even steroids. All that is back at the field hospital and I can’t bring you there. Because you know, what if you turn again and there’s no guarantee that your brain won’t say, ‘nope not this time, I think I’ll be a … monster’ for lack of a better word.”
“Can she be treated here?” Tom asked.
“Yeah, but I can’t …” James cringed. “I hate to say it, but I can’t stay and take care of her. I’m on no sleep for days and I’ll be no good if I collapse.”
“I’ll stay,” Ella said. “I’ll stay with her. I’m not a trained medical professional, but I handled a lot of the medical and medicine at Sanctum. I’ll stay. I’m guessing, what? We’ll know in a couple days if she is gonna pull through.”
“Probably less.”
“Then I’ll stay. I need to rest anyhow.”
“No offense,” James said. “But what if you turn? You were bit. We don’t know if the cure works.”
“Doctor Ung, I would be sick by now,” Ella said. “But I understand.”
“I’ll be here,” Tom said. “I’ll watch them both. I’ll go with you to the station, get what we need and ….” He glanced at Rhonda. “The baby. I’ll bring him back. I’ll be here if there’s trouble. It’s a couple days, right? It’s the least I can go. I … did this to her.”
“Major Tom,” Rhonda spoke weakly. “You act as if you created a Frankenstein’s Monster. You didn’t. You saved my life.”
Again, Tom nodded in a humbling manner.
James relented and agreed to the home care supervised by Tom. A part of him still felt uneasy because of the unknown effects of the cure. Rhonda was grateful, claiming Tom saved her. Whether or not that would be a good thing, still remained to be seen.
TWENTY – REST
Once during his residency, James suffered from sleep deprivation. He was young and cocky, certain that he could go without sleep and without it affecting him.
He was wrong.
He knew he had to rest when he started seeing purple rabbits hopping about the hospital. They were in hospital scrubs, and talked to him. He knew where the hallucinations came from. They were a product of a book he had read to a child in the hospital. Yet, James kept pushing until he woke up with a huge headache and stitches on this cheek from when his body said ‘enough is enough’ and he just dropped over.
He was almost to that point again. He supposed hitting that bottle Ella gave him didn’t help. James knew he was tired, but was nowhere near the tipping point, even though it had been two decades since his residence days. At least that's what he thought, then the hallucinations started. This time it wasn’t purple rabbits, it was a giant baby, wearing only a diaper thumping down the road.
“Did you see that?” James asked the soldier who was driving.
“See what?”
“That six foot baby?”
“Can’t say that I did.”
“Okay, just checking.”
“Too much of that?” The soldier pointed to the bottle that peeked out of his bag.
“And lack of sleep.” James gave a closed mouth smile and rested back. By his calculations he had another hour in him before he hit the end of his energy. No amount of energy drinks would save him. Then again, he would be home before that point.
And he was.
He thanked the driver, swaying his way to his house and declining the help. Once inside, he locked the door, and since he had electricity, cranked the air conditioning so the house would remain cool during the black out.
With just enough energy left, he made himself a peanut butter sandwich, grabbed a bottle of water and sat on the couch. He ate the sandwich, alternating between the water and the bourbon Ella gave him to wash it down.
By the time he was finished, he was a bad mixture of drunk and tired. He could barely set the bourbon and water on the coffee table. James leaned back on the couch to take a moment before trudging up the stairs, but he didn’t make it. The second he closed his eyes, his body slid sideways and the second his head hit the seat cushion, James was fast asleep.
TWENTY-ONE – RAIL TALK
The air was stifling, humid … hot. The scientific fact that heat rises, combined with no electricity made the upper floor apartment unbearable.
Tom took all clothing from the newborn and placed him, wearing only a diaper in his crib.
Rhonda was resting, though not sleeping. In the course of five hours her eye color returned, and no longer did she have that severe glaucoma look.
Little Rodney went down easily. He ate two ounces, burped without a problem and fell fast asleep.
Even without any experience, Tom had a knack with him and liked taking care of him.
It took his mind off things and Tom was a man with a lot on his mind.
Just in c
ase Doctor Ung needed or anyone else for that matter, Tom documented each hour’s progress with Rhonda and Ella. Though he wasn’t a doctor, he believed they were doing well and the cure was working on them.
After placing the baby down and in a separate room from Rhonda, just as a precaution, he sought out Ella. Not only did she have the bottle of bourbon, he needed rest and she seemed well enough to take a watch.
He panicked a little when he didn’t see her, until he noticed the open window outside the kitchen, that was where he saw her. She had climbed out and stood on the fire escape.
He grabbed a cup from the kitchen and stepped out of the window. “Mind if I join you?”
“No, not at all.” She leaned over the fire escape railing.
“May I?” Tom pointed to the bottle by her feet.
“Help yourself.”
He lifted the bottle and poured some in his glass. “You look like you have a lot on your mind.”
“I do. She added some booze to her glass and took a drink. “One of which is my camp. We’re pretty tight there. I can't help but imagine they think I'm dead.”
“Do you have family there?”
Ella shook her head. “I did. They passed away early on. But I can image they’re pretty worried.”
“How about … how about tomorrow when I go for supplies, and let my post know where I am, I radio your camp?”
She glanced at him. “You’re cute, Major, but honestly, we’re off the grid for communication.”
“No, you’re not.”
“Sure, we are. I would know,” Ella said.
“No, you wouldn’t.” He cleared his throat. “Because it was impossible to get your camp out of there. Because the military feared that if they somehow rescued you that the Codies would follow, they left you there. You were made to believe that you couldn’t leave.”
Ella looked at him with confusion. “I don’t understand.”
“There is no way to get a hundred and three of you out of there. Plus, your presence there. They believe is keeping those Codies there.”
“So, we are bait?’
“In a sense. This is not my call.” Tom lifted his hand. “Just what I know.”
“Then how do you know you can radio.”
“What I heard. They talk regularly to a guy named Grant.”
Ella paused rolling her glass in her hand. “Wow.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be. It isn’t you keeping us there. It … it isn’t Grant either. It’s just the way things are. However, …” she downed her drink. “I will be having words with him when I get back for not telling me.” She refreshed her drink.
“Do you want me to try to radio them and let them know you’re alive.”
“Yeah, please do’
“Change of subject?” Tom sipped his drink.
“Yes, please.”
“How are you feeling?”
“Good. My surgical site is a bit sore and tight.”
“How much did he take off?”
“Not much. You know, you are really good with the baby. Do you have kids?’
“No. None. Not even a wife,” Tom replied. “You?”
“I had just gotten married when everything happened. Bruce died one month later.”
“I’m sorry to hear that.”
“Yeah, me, too. Especially after …” Ella pointed backwards with her thumb.
“What do you mean?”
“My husband was bit and wouldn’t come into the compound. Instead, he stayed outside, died and revived. But he never left. He paced back and forth.” Ella softly chuckled. “Every day I went out there, watched him, wishing you know, wishing he knew me. I’d have entire conversations with him and hoped he understood me. Now … now I know, he probably did.” She brought her drink to her lips. “And I did nothing. God!” she shook her head. “I have to wonder if he was looking at me, trying to get me to do something and I just rambled. I just let him go until he turned to the point he couldn’t come back.”
“I know how you feel.”
Ella looked at him.
“My job has me rectifying a lot of people.”
“Yes, I know, you’re famous for it.”
“What do you mean?”
“On the streets they call you the Grim Reaper.”
“Whoa,” he said facetiously. “I didn’t know that. But as I was saying, I rectify. Now ... now I wonder if those people, the ones that stared at me, that didn’t attack were looking at me and trying to say, ‘hey I am still in here. Help me.’”
“They probably were.”
“Gee, thank you for that.”
“No, I didn’t mean it to make you feel bad. I just … you didn’t know. How would you know?”
“I did after June.”
“What happened to her?” Ella asked.
“I rectified her. She was bit, revived and now I think about it … she didn’t attack. She believed so badly that those who were calm and docile were those who still remained in their bodies. Trapped, unable to do anything about it. She probably proved her theory and I shot her.”
“Let me tell you something Major, If this cure doesn’t work on me, if I die and revive. Unless I speak the words, please don’t, you have my permission to rectify me without feeling bad. Because I don’t want to be them.” She pointed down to the street. “Calm or crazy, I don’t want to be one of them.”
Tom peered over the railing. Dozens of Codies meandered about. Some saw them on the fire escape and were reaching up as if their arms would suddenly have extended four stories.
“Is there something happening I don’t know about?” Ella asked. “Am I missing something?
“What do you mean?”
“I’m in this part of town … a lot. After curfew, too. I have never seen more than one or two of them on the streets. It’s still daylight. What’s going on?”
Tom looked around the streets. “I don’t see any soldiers.”
“You won’t. They don’t patrol this area, this neighborhood has its own rectifiers, if you will. Neighborhood guys that sit on the corner, taking them out. But ... they aren’t there. No one’s there.”
Tom finished his drink. “I’ll be back. When I do, I’m gonna get some sleep if you don’t mind. Maybe you can keep an eye on things.”
“Sure, but …where are you going?” she asked as he reached for the window.
“Down there. See if I can find out answers. There’s too many on the streets and no one on patrol. You’re right, we’re missing something. I’m gonna go find out.”
“Be careful.”
Tom paused as he climbed through the window. “I will. Thank you.”
After he climbed back in, Ella returned to peering to the street. She heard the door open and close, then she watched until she saw Tom.
He handled the revived with ease, shoving them aside and moving through them carefully without being attacked.
With the exception of the South Side, everything was always under control. She had to be over reacting, more than likely it was just an off night.
She stayed on the fire escape a few more minutes, then she would go back inside to check on Rhonda and the baby. She wouldn’t stay inside long though, dead on the street causing a stench or not, it was just too hot to be inside, and a fire escape four stories up was a pretty safe place to be.
TWENTY-TWO – TENT ONE
There wasn’t any specific sound that woke James, just the fact that he finally had enough sleep, perhaps. Maybe even more than he needed. With a groan, he rolled from the couch with a bang to the floor, feeling the thump as a mighty pain that ricocheted straight to his head.
On his knees, James brought his hands to his head and groaned again,
“What the hell is wrong with me? Why would I drink so much?”
Blindly he reached for the bottle of water on the coffee table and gulped it as if it would instantly hydrate him and rid him of the excruciating headache that pounded away at his brain.
The water did nothing but cause a lump in his chest that rolled down to his empty stomach.
When he finally opened his eyes enough, he realized two things. One, it was hot, too hot and the other, the lighting was off.
When he got home from his marathon aid and inoculate session, it was Tuesday late morning. He couldn’t have been up much longer than that. But the lighting from outside suggested it was afternoon.
Had James only slept a couple of hours.
He pushed the coffee table out of the way, rolled on to his back and lay there for a moment. He brought his watch into his view and focused.
Wait. What? he thought. It was Wednesday?
Clearly his watch said August 23. And it certainly wasn’t one in the morning, the bright sun told him that.
James had slept over twenty-four hours.
Not only did his head make him feel horrible, the fact that he didn’t return to the field hospital to check on Rhonda and Ella made him feel worse.
He had nine hours to before his shift at Mon Valley. He would go into the city and check on them and Tom. James was surprised that Tom hadn’t been by at all.
It took all his strength to stand.
Not only did he have a headache from hell, his stomach was queasy and he was dizzy. He staggered into the kitchen and grabbed a bottle of water, placing it in his one cup coffee machine. Just as he was about to add a coffee pod, he noticed the power light was off.
He pressed it.
Nothing.
“Great. Swell. No power and I need coffee.”
All was not lost. He opened his refrigerator and grabbed a bottle of iced coffee, he always had those handy. He drank it quickly. So fast, that like the water, it hurt his chest. But it gave him a burst of caffeine.
His plan was to shower, that would help to hydrate him, then after he was dressed he’d head into the city, stopping at the coffee shop on the way, of course.
After picking out his day’s clothes, he undressed and stepped into the shower. James didn’t care if the water was cold, it would be a relief. I had to be at least eighty degrees and humid in his house.
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