by Brown, TW
“Okay.” I hated when they said there was just one more problem. Like all of this wasn’t enough?
The man waded out of the group with one of the children clutching his coat sleeve. Damn!
The child had one arm wrapped in bloody rags that still dripped. The eyes were dark brown, and there wasn’t much in the way of whites to be seen. But what was visible told me all I needed to know.
“Umm…” I really had nothing I could say. I think I started babbling because Jon nudged me with his elbow…hard.
“One of you is going to have to come with us.” Jon stepped up to the child and knelt. His voice changed in an instant. “Hi there. What’s your name?”
“Tina,” the little girl said barely above a whisper.
“That’s a pretty name,” Jon said. “My name is Jon.”
“Are you a soldier?” the girl asked, her uninjured hand letting go of the man she’d been clinging to and touching the insignia on the sleeve of Jon’s jacket.
“I am a Marine,” Jon said, the pride ringing in his voice.
“Like in the water?” Tina quizzed.
Jon laughed. It was a good laugh that made a smile twitch at the corners of the child’s mouth. I watched the other two children begin to drift forward.
“So, Tina,” Jon clasped the child’s hand, “how would you like to meet a friend of mine named Sunshine?”
“Sunshine?” the girl asked, scrunching up her nose. “That’s a funny name.”
Jon stood and began to lead the child away. I noticed a few of the people in the group make a move, but the man who I deduced to actually be the leader despite who’d done all the talking thus far shook his head.
“My name is Sahiba.” The woman bowed at the waist slightly. I noted the heavy accent on the middle syllable.
“Well, Sahiba, my name is Steve.” I didn’t have any idea what sort of protocol was proper here and decided that if I offended one of these people it was their problem and not mine. I extended my hand. She clasped it and, as if it were the signal, the others stepped forward and began throwing names at me that I would not likely remember for a while. The last to come forward was the tall, dark-skinned man.
“My name is Enuma,” the man said very slowly. It was clear that he struggled with English. “I am from Nigeria.” Then he spoke to Sahiba in a language I could not begin to decipher. The pair had a brief exchange before Sahiba returned her attention to me.
“Enuma asks what will become of the girl?”
Well that was a good question, and I honestly did not have any idea what Jon had in mind. The entire group seemed to lean forward awaiting my response.
“Why don’t we walk up to the house and find out,” I suggested. “All I ask is that those of you who are infected, please avail yourselves to our doctor once we get there.”
Sahiba rattled off what I assumed were my instructions. Now at least I understood why she was the chosen spokesperson. I wondered if any of the others spoke English at all…or at the very least, understood.
We made the trek to the house and I made a conscious effort to put my back to the new arrivals. I guess I hoped that I was conveying a sense of trust. By the time we reached the big porch of the visitor’s center, a crowd was waiting to greet us.
“I understand there are some infected in the group?” Dr. Zahn spoke first. “If they would please come with me.” Sahiba said something, and I noticed everybody in her group exchange questioning glances.
DeAngelo stepped down the porch stairs and spoke in what I had to assume was the same language the group had been conversing. I hope my eyes didn’t bulge too far out of my head. His presence had an immediate effect on the group. In a rush, there was a flurry of conversation.
“You agreed to put them down?” DeAngelo turned to me with a raised eyebrow.
“They asked for those infected to be killed,” I replied. “They are out of ammunition and none of the ones who are showing the visible signs wanted to wait.”
“And Jon took a child?” he continued.
“Umm…yeah.”
“They want to know if you will be burning the bodies.”
“That is fairly standard,” I said with a nod. I sensed from the question that this was going to be a problem.
“Their Muslim faith forbids it.” DeAngelo listened as the group started in again. “And they ask if the bodies will be allowed to be bathed, wrapped in shrouds, and buried instead of burned. If not, the ones infected will leave of their own accord, but I think the group will go as one to be with their brethren.”
I thought it over briefly and decided it couldn’t hurt. If we were indeed going to try and be a welcoming place for survivors, we should probably start accepting everybody regardless of their beliefs. Hadn’t we seen enough of what intolerance could do in the Old World?
“Tell them we will help in whatever way is needed to ensure that they are given a proper death.”
Just then, Emily and Thalia burst out onto the porch, both out of breath. They saw the new arrivals and squealed in excitement. The young boy and girl in the group stared wide-eyed at the two girls jumping up and down excitedly.
“This is Thalia and Emily,” I said, gesturing to the pair. DeAngelo said something and the only thing I recognized were the names of the girls. The boy said something to Sahiba and she nodded.
“My name is Levent, and this is my cousin Rabia,” the young boy spoke in very clean English.
“Welcome to our home,” DeAngelo whispered in my ear. I repeated it and he translated for the adults.
“Hey,” Sunshine stepped out onto the porch, “is anybody here related to Tina?” After some back and forth, we discovered that her mother had been with the group, but perished pulling her daughter free from a mob of the zombies that delivered the bite that would be the child’s death sentence.
“Okay, then would anybody care to be with her now? I am giving her a tea that will shut her system down. It is a fast-acting…” she glanced at the children, “p-o-i-s-o-n.” Levent and Emily both made little noises. That let her know they could spell better than she gave credit. She cursed under her breath, her face a sudden deep red. “She won’t feel a thing and will simply drift off to sleep,” she added hastily.
Enuma spoke up and stepped forward after DeAngelo had translated. He and Sahiba followed Sunshine inside leaving me with the rest of the group. I turned to DeAngelo, “Care to tell me about any other languages you might be capable of speaking?”
“My father was from Nigeria,” he replied. “I recognized the man’s dialect. I only get about half of what they are saying, and I probably sound like a pre-schooler when I talk, but I can get the gist.”
“So what are we supposed to do about these bodies?” I asked. “We have always torched the corpses.”
“Take them out in the woods; I’m sure we can help these people find a suitable place.”
A squeal of laughter from up on the porch snapped my head around. Emily was pointing and jumping up and down with an ear-to-ear smile on her face. I turned to try and see what she was pointing at, but nothing stood out. Thalia whispered something and the two girls started giggling like fiends. Emily said something to Levent and he passed it on to Rabia, his hand cupped to her ear. Now all four children had conspiratorial smiles on their faces.
“What’s the deal?” I walked up onto the porch, still casting glances over my shoulder to try and figure out what the fuss was all about.
“More snow, Papí!” Thalia practically shrieked.
I turned to look. Sure enough, large flakes were drifting to the ground. Great, more snow, I thought. I’ve lived in these parts long enough to know what a big storm looks like. This one was gonna suck. The clouds were heavy and dark, adding grayness to the entire world…or at least the world as we knew it.
***
I looked down at the girl on the bed. With her eyes closed, she could be a playmate for Thalia and Emily. However, the moment that she opened those eyes, she would be Death.
Her che
st still rose and fell in short, shallow hitches. Sunshine and Dr. Zahn stood on either side of Tina. I forced myself to use her name in my thoughts. Despite what was about to happen, she was a person…a child.
“So now what?” I asked.
“It shouldn’t be much longer,” Dr. Zahn said while checking the child’s pulse. “Her heart rate is slowing considerably.”
“I’ve never done this sort of thing,” Sunshine said to nobody in particular. She leaned close to Tina’s face and brushed a strand of hair away. “I mean I knew when Dr. Zahn told me what she wanted, and what we would use it for…I just never thought…” Her voice trailed off.
A moment later, Tina’s tiny frame began to shudder. I glanced at Dr. Zahn who still held the child’s wrist. The convulsions ceased and Dr. Zahn looked up at me and nodded.
Taking a deep breath, I covered Tina’s face with a piece of cloth and placed the spike where I guessed the center of the forehead to be. I said a brief prayer in my mind and brought the mallet down firmly. It took three whacks.
Sunshine had stepped back at some point and began to cry. I hung the mallet on the wall in its place and moved out of the way so that Dr. Zahn could tuck everything in and zip up the body bag.
“Tell her people that they can do what needs to be done for the funeral,” the doctor said.
I went to the door and took a second to compose myself. I had made the choice to be the one in the room after Jon, Sunshine and Dr. Zahn told me what was to be done. I was still the de facto leader of this group by consensus. That meant it was my responsibility to do the dirty work. At least that’s how I see it. Maybe if we vote in a committee, things will change. Maybe we will have some sort of euthanasia team.
I left the room and stepped into controlled chaos. Teresa, Melissa, Fiona and Sahiba were bundling the children up to go outside and play in the snow. Glancing out the window, I could see that we’d already had a few more inches in just the short time I’d been in Dr. Zahn’s trauma room. DeAngelo was over with his wife speaking with Enuma, and Jon had Jesus and Jake gearing up in patrol gear. I had no idea why and would check into it after I passed on the news that Tina was dead.
“Daddy Steve!” Emily bounded up to me with a huge smile. “Jamie has another sled for us to play on the hill with!”
“That’s great, sweetie,” I said and knelt to give her gear a looking over. I wasn’t exactly sure what I was looking for, but I remember my mother doing that when I was a little boy about to go outside and play in the snow.
“He said it was supposed to be one of my birthday presents, but since the snow couldn’t wait, neither can my present!”
Crap, I thought, we still have a birthday to put on. Not that I wasn’t happy for the change of pace from the norm, it was just that, with a dead child in the other room, plus three adults about to receive the same treatment, it was difficult to muster enthusiasm.
“Well then you go out and have fun,” I said, giving her a squeeze.
“Are you coming out to watch?” Emily stared up at me expectantly with her dark eyes. Double crap.
“I’ll be out there in just a bit,” I said absently. My eyes had suddenly found one of the infected. It was a woman, and she was slumped over near the door to the sleeping area. I thought they had all been isolated.
Getting up, I instinctively put myself between the infected individual and Emily. I scanned the room for Billy. He had been tasked with keeping an eye on the trio while they awaited their turn with Sunshine and Dr. Zahn.
I heard a scream come from the kitchen at the same time that Brad crashed through the doorway holding a man at arm’s length. Jon was closest and pulled a knife from his belt in a flash. It felt like everything slowed down in that instant as I watched the blade catch enough of the light from the fireplace to cast a single beam of bright orange that danced down the wall. He drove the blade into the back of the man’s skull and the three figures vanished from sight behind the table.
DeAngelo made for the kitchen, and I quickly corralled the girls to the ladder that led up to the lookout tower. “Go up with Fiona until this is over,” I said, turning my attention back to the room, and specifically the woman slumped in the corner.
A low moan rolled through the room from the kitchen and I heard a loud sound that could only be a pan of some sort connecting with a skull. Everybody was trying to rush into the back, including the newcomers, and completely ignoring the woman.
I stopped a few feet away, my field machete in hand, and drew my arm back to deliver the killing blow. Just then, the woman’s head popped up. I could see the black tracers in her eyes, but not the white film that indicated she’d died.
“Do it,” she breathed. “It hurts…everything hurts. My body feels like it is on fire.” Her accent was thick with what I imagined to be the same dialect Enuma spoke, but she was speaking English!
I wanted to bring the blade down, but looking directly into her eyes, even though I knew what was about to be her ultimate fate, I still hesitated. Yes, I’ve had to kill a few folks who were still alive, but only once was I looking the person in the eyes. In my defense, I’d been in a state of rage. I wasn’t feeling anything like that at the moment. All I felt was…pity. Her eyes locked onto mine and I saw understanding. She closed them, knelt, and bowed her head. I took a deep breath and swung down hard. I felt the stinging reverberation all the way up both arms.
The chaos was dying down almost as soon as it had started. The variety of expressions ranged from fear—most of the new arrivals had huddled together and I bet they were wondering how we would respond to some of theirs turning in our home—to confusion. We hadn’t ever had to deal with zombies in our new home. They’d come close to overrunning us once, but we held them off outside.
“Where’s Billy?” I called out.
“Here,” he replied as he came out of the kitchen.
“What the hell happened?” I bit back the anger. He wasn’t the type to flake off things. I was sure he had a reason.
“I heard Jamie crying,” Billy said sheepishly.
“You what?”
“You need to come in back,” he whispered. For some reason, he couldn’t look me in the eyes. “I’ll get the doctor, and Jon looks like he has a handle in here, but you need to go in back…now.”
I didn’t like any of this. Something dark settled in my heart in that moment; a feeling of dread and doom unlike anything I’d felt since this whole thing started all those months ago. That is saying a lot.
I glanced around the room before I left. The girls were in the corner with Melissa. They looked a bit rattled, but far better than a child should be considering everything that went on around them. Jon, Jake, and Jesus were with DeAngelo and the newcomers. In this world, I guess that is about as under control as I could hope for.
I went back to where Jamie and Teresa slept. I could hear the sobbing already. It was Jamie. I thought I could make out the words “I’m sorry” but it was too difficult to tell.
When I walked in and saw Teresa sitting up in bed, I knew.
Jamie had his head down in her lap, and she was stroking his head. That was not going to be enough to comfort him, of that I had no doubt.
When had I dropped to my knees?
I realized where I was and climbed to my feet. It wasn’t easy. I had no strength all of a sudden. Still, I forced myself to take each of the three steps it took to get to the side of Teresa’s bed. Jamie never moved, never so much as acknowledged my presence. I didn’t blame him.
“You see it, too.” It was a statement. I had no idea how long I stood there and stared down at her, but Teresa never even seemed to blink. I kept wishing to God that she would blink. Then, at least for one split second, I wouldn’t see the black traces in those eyes.
5
Vignettes XX
Aaheru stood on the crumbling remains of the wall that had circled this “city” for so many years. It had been known as The City of the Dead for decades. Cairo’s population had long since
outstripped its capacity. The poor had no place else to turn, and had claimed this vast graveyard as their home. Now, it stood as the last bastion (as far as he and the others knew, at least) against the dead.
One of the millions whose stench floated on the cool desert evening air stood below him, its hands reaching desperately for the living being that stood above. Ahi pulled the long spear from his back and jabbed it down into the eye socket of the horrific creature.
“Why waste your energy, brother?” Aaheru whispered. “Another will fill its place.”
“It is one less that we will face when we leave.” Ahi shook his spear free and lined up to jab another. The sea of heads stretched out before them gave an endless supply of targets to choose amongst.
“We will not be facing them when we leave, my brother.”
Ahi jabbed, yanked the spear free and faced Aaheru. “What do you have planned?”
“There can only be so many that come on this journey,” Aaheru said with no emotion. “I will deem who comes…”
“And the others?”
“Will be given a different path.”
Ahi plunged his spear down again into the eye of a boy that could have been the playmate of his son…the son who had perished in a crowd of those things the first days when the dead had returned to take vengeance on the living. “Do you believe they will go willingly?”
“I do not care,” Aaheru said with a shrug. “We have the guns and the knives.”
Ahi glanced back into the gray sprawl of monuments and tombs, to where the last sons and daughters of Cairo struggled to survive. Those who had once called this armpit of the underworld their home now served Aaheru and those who he had brought with him all those weeks ago when there were no places left to run or hide in the city any longer.
Ahi remembered the killing. It had been a necessary evil to make the point clear that none of the tribal leaders held power any longer now that a real citizen of Cairo had arrived. The soldiers who had chosen to follow Aaheru—Ahi included—had gunned down the elders without mercy. Aaheru had told them that as long as one remained, there was a chance for rebellion. “Cut off the head, and the body will be helpless…much like the walking dead,” were his exact words.