by Stu Jones
“It seems,” Rick continued, “that the attacks are still coming, but they are much less frequent now. The last reports that came in were over six hours ago and stated that the United States had may have suffered an estimated 60 percent casualties in the first wave. Many deaths were from nuclear devices detonated over cities to achieve maximum effect. Several cities took direct hits, including New York and Washington DC.”
“Miami. What about Miami?” Kane muttered anxiously under his breath. Radio Rick continued his report.
“Those that were missed or not targeted were either crippled, due to the electromagnetic pulse discharge of the nukes, or were hit with other munitions. For example, another weapon used in the first wave against us was some type of new prototype weapon engineered by the terrorist group called The Sword of Destiny. We don’t know much about it, but apparently, it is a chemical substance similar to napalm—but worse, designed to drown entire cities in liquid fire. This weapon was created to be deliverable via ICBM missiles.”
“The rest of the casualties came from the second wave of attacks, which happened right on the heels of the first. The second wave was nationwide ‘blanket’ attacks with various chemical and biological agents, including a super virus called Chimera. According to this report, it is a concoction of smallpox, Marburg, Ebola, VEE, and Machupo viruses. This super virus was studied at length by the CDC before the attacks and their information shows that its rate of lethality is very high and that it kills within days. Apparently, it was designed upon detonation to disperse into the atmosphere so that it rains or ‘snows’ down in ash clumps over large areas.”
“This stuff is airborne—and is everywhere. Apart from causing mass casualties, the CDC also reports that the virus had some strange and unexpected effects on certain infected subjects. For example, the information I have here indicates that some of the people infected with the super virus do not immediately die. Instead, their bodies began to mutate and deform as they devolve into a state of madness, dementia, and eventually death. At the point of mutation, they became carriers of the disease, but it is unknown how the disease is transmitted from that point on. They also report that a limited number of individuals exposed to the virus showed no signs of infection. The reasons for this are unknown.”
“Last reports were that when the attacks began, many of the world’s nations retaliated blindly out of fear and confusion, which only continued and expanded the already massive losses of much of the world’s population.”
The radio hissed static, and Kane hissed back. “Come on, tell me something more about Miami.” He continued to adjust the knob back and forth.
The reception came through again.
“I don’t know how long the others and I will make it in here without proper resources, but I’ll broadcast as long as I can. Right now I’ve got to rest for a few and recheck the barricades on the main level. Good luck, everyone.”
More static. Kane snapped the radio back off as he hung his head in a defeated posture and looked over at Barney, snoozing on the blanket.
“Barney,” he whispered. “It’s worse than I thought.”
DAY 5
ASHEVILLE, NORTH CAROLINA
In the dark of the meat freezer, a shadow shifted. A man known only as Malak stood in the cold dark and rubbed his bald head. He’d had enough. His large form moved past and inbetween the shelves of thawing meat. The freezer had been off for days but it had been so well insulated that it retained its temperature. Still, it was now warming, he could feel it.
Malak stepped over several shelves that had toppled over and moved to the heavy door he had barricaded from the inside. This was ridiculous; he had been down in this meat freezer for days. Whatever had happened out there had happened already. He was tired of eating frozen slabs of raw meat. He had stayed as long as he had in the freezer because he knew that if the United States was attacked, chemicals and diseases would be used—whatever would kill the most people the fastest, regardless of how inhumane. He began moving the junk that barred the door and pressed his ear to it. Nothing. For all he knew, everyone was dead and everything was gone, which would be fine with him.
Malak had been on his way from Dallas to visit one of his arms dealers in Richmond, Virginia. He and his boys had driven all night and had stopped for breakfast in Asheville, North Carolina when the first missile hit. Without hesitation, he ditched his crew and ran across the street. Desperate for cover from the madness, he had kicked in the back door of a meat-packing facility. Three of the plant workers tried to get into the industrial freezer with him. Two he shot to pieces, and the third he beat bloody with a broken mop handle before taking the guy’s thick winter jacket. That was a good choice, the jacket. He would have frozen damn solid without it.
Malak unbolted the door and leaned his weight into it. Even in the dim light of the warehouse, Malak had to squint. The plant was torn open on all sides, and everything was strewn about as if the building had been hit by a tornado. If there was still something in the air, it would probably kill him quick. He stood just outside the door, breathing deeply and letting his eyes adjust to the light. He was feeling pretty good so far. He took a few more steps and again surveyed his surroundings. Looking to his right, he could see the street outside through a gaping hole in the wall, its jagged edges like the gaping mouth of some beast. Malak took a few steps toward the hole and stopped. At 6’6” and 325 pounds, Malak was a monster of a man, but he was still unarmed.
“Shouldn’t have fired all my bullets at the meat packers,” he said, laughing to himself at how their title was also an insult. He stooped to grab a piece of rebar with concrete on the end of it.
Better than nothing.
As he stepped through the hole and into the street, the scene the greeted him was something straight out of the old Twilight Zone series. The city was a picture of destruction—buildings crumbled, fires raged, cars sat unmanned at dead traffic lights, and nothing lived or moved in the eerie silence. Malak shielded his eyes and looked toward the sky. A thick, churning charcoal sea rolled across the heavens and thundered into the distance.
“Amazing,” Malak said in awe as a bitter wind stung his face. He drew the smallish coat around him and tensed, hearing faltering footsteps approaching from behind him. He turned to see a man in a soiled coat and tie pleading desperately. The man appeared to have significant burns.
“Sir, sir, please help me! I’m injured!”
Malak spun around, swinging the rebar, and struck the man in the side, knocking him to the ground. The man screamed.
“Aggh, no! Please don’t!” the man cried out as he slid down the mound of rubble.
Malak pursued him down the slope, a terrible look of satisfaction on his face. The concrete on the end of the rebar had broken loose.
“Wait! Wait! I haven’t done anything to you! Wait! No!”
Malak stepped up to the man and murderously drove the rebar into his midsection. The air exploded with the man’s screams as Malak withdrew the rebar and drove it into him again and again. Blood streamed onto the broken concrete slab as Malak stared with cold intent into the eyes of the dying man.
“Why? Why did you…kill…” The dying man gasped.
“Because there’s no one to stop me!” Malak snarled.
The man struggled for another moment before succumbing to the inevitable. Malak looked up and around, eyeing his surroundings.
“Hey!” Malak yelled at the top of his lungs. “I just killed a fucking guy in the street for no reason!”
He cocked his head and waited for the screams, sirens, anything. The ashen city failed to move in the following stillness as its fiery master flickered and continued to consume it. Still nothing. Malak took in the devastation of his surroundings and smiled.
More footsteps approached from around the diner in front of him. Two men rounded the corner, one with a semiautomatic handgun.
“Malak! No way, dude, how did you make it?” the stocky Hispanic male asked.
“Good to see you made it, Malak,” said the other man, who had dark skin and short dark hair. “Back to your old trade already?” he asked, motioning toward the dead man.
“Sanchez, Dagen. You must have done something right in a previous life,” Malak said coldly. “Where’d you get the HI-Point?” Malak motioned for Sanchez to give the weapon to him. The stocky man hesitated but passed the handgun over.
“Out of a car over there, two streets over,” Sanchez said, motioning.
“Where’s Ashteroth?” Malak asked as he looked the cheap, blocky handgun over.
“Look,” Sanchez broke in. “We’re through with Ashteroth. Besides, he’s probably cooked up like everyone else. It’s our time now, boys; this is what we’re going to do….”
The gun recoiled twice in Malak’s hand, the shots echoing across the deserted street. Dagen looked at Sanchez, who fell to his knees, clawing at the two bloody holes in his chest.
“You…” Sanchez sputtered and rolled to his side.
Malak swung the gun on Dagen.
“Shoot me.” Dagen held Malak’s gaze, his face a picture of unnatural calm.
Malak continued muzzling Dagen. “Do you hear that?” Malak said in almost a whisper.
Dagen did not reply.
“Do you hear it?” Malak snapped.
“I don’t hear anything,” Dagen said, smiling wildly.
“Exactly! No sirens, no screams. No one cares if you live or die.”
“Then shoot me. The world is dead, Malak.”
Something dark gleamed in Malak’s eyes, like the nothingness behind the eyes of a shark. “Sanchez here was not with me. He was only for himself. Are you with me, Dagen?” Malak pushed the gun barrel closer to Dagen’s head.
“I’m with you. I’ve always been with you. Wherever. So either shoot me or let’s get on with it.”
Malak lowered the gun, smiling. “You’re almost as crazy as I am.”
“That’s not news…so what do we do now, boss?”
“Find Ashteroth,” Malak said. “And when you’ve found him, we’ll begin.”
“And if he’s…” Dagen started.
“He’s alive, just like the rest of the cockroaches. Just find him.”
“Specifics on recruits?” Dagen asked.
“See if we can find some working vehicles. Food. Water. When you find them, gather a few women and children as slaves and hostages, just in case there is some sort of police or military presence that we need to overcome. Recruit murderers, rapists, sickos, psychos, and anyone willing to do what I command without question.” A look of grim pleasure crossed Malak’s face. “I need soldiers.”
Bethany Parsons had never felt so ill in her entire life. She stopped in the street and closed her eyes as each beat of her hammering heart caused her head to throb. Her stomach turned, and a feeling of nausea overcame her. The rancid, uncooked meat she had found and consumed in the ruined food market had not agreed with her, but she had craved it, she had needed it. Her vision blurred with the pain, and she was overcome with a terrible weakness that threatened to steal her balance. She wiped more tears from her face and began to cry.
How is this happening? Where is the National Guard?
Her family was gone. The modest apartment downtown where her mother and younger brother lived was now nothing more than a pile of smoldering rubble. The building was gone, as was her family. Bethany wiped a few tears from her eyes as she tried to get a grip on the terror and loneliness that surrounded her.
She had been in Atlanta for three days and had yet to find any organized help like she had hoped she would. What she had found were people— others who had come into the city to find help. Thousands of them were strewn across the city. But they weren’t okay. Everyone appeared to be sick. Many refused to talk to her, and the ones that would speak did so in an incoherent babble. Some lay lifelessly on the sidewalk and in the street, while others wandered aimless through the wreckage of the city. It felt like a terrible dream.
She stumbled around a corner and onto Peachtree Street, where she saw a man dressed in the army combat uniform digital fatigues just ahead of her.
“Wait! Sir, please!” Bethany called out with a croak to the silhouette that began shuffling away from her and into the smoke and debris.
“Sir, please, are you with the army? Where do I need to go? To get help?” she said, half pleading as the man stopped and began to vomit into the street.
Bethany lowered her outstretched hand and winced as the man continued to wretch, expelling a greenish-yellow substance from his mouth. She picked nervously at one of the many large pus-filled boils that had risen up on her arms, face, and body—everywhere the poisonous ash had touched her.
“Hey, are you okay?” she asked as she approached and reached out her hand again. “Are you sick too? We should find some help. You’re with the Guard….”
“No!” came the ragged reply. “No one left. They’re all gone. Gone away.” The man crouched, hiding his face and rocking his body as he wiped away the greenish slime that hung from the corner of his mouth.
“But, the other people…” she began, her tongue stroking across blistered lips. “They said to come here. Where’s the rest of…” she mumbled as the man turned his back to her.
“Sick. Everyone sick. Dead already. Sick and dead. Sick and dead.” He vomited again with a terrible groan, his body shaking violently as the bloody slime mixture splashed onto the concrete.
Bethany gasped and stepped back as he retched again and again. The man scrambled across the ground on all fours and wiped the sleeve of his uniform across his mouth. He continued to hide his face.
“Leave alone. Sick,” he muttered roughly.
Bethany took two steps and came within an arm’s length of the crouching man. “Please.”
The speed at which the man rose, swiping broken fingernails across the flesh of her face, startled her. Bethany screamed and fell backward into the debris-filled street, clutching her face.
“Leave alone!” he screamed. He raised his emaciated head and stared her in the face, the hollowed, bleeding sockets of his eyes emanating a ghoulish appearance. “You leave alone!”
“Okay!” Bethany cried out as she stumbled backward, holding a hand to her bloodied face.
“Sick. Everyone. Sick and dead. You too,” he said as he turned and moaned, shuffling away into the smoke.
Bethany began to weep as the blood dribbled down her face and dripped onto her shirt. She looked around as she cried and tried to process what was happening. It was all too much. The vicious desolation of the dead city closed in, smothering her with the smell of decay. She struggled to her knees and used her shirt to dab at her face, noticing the diamond tennis bracelet that her mother had given her. It was still so beautiful and seemed like such a foreign object in her current state of desperation. The diamonds and gold sparkled as her tears mixed with blood and splashed across them.
Bethany coughed, gagging as her insides twisted. Rolling with mad contortions like a wounded serpent, her stomach writhed as she dropped onto all fours and began to vomit.
DAY 13
Kane lowered himself down to rest on his stomach on the cool concrete floor. He had just finished his second set of 150 pushups. He would do a third set before he went to bed later. He had been in this bunker for what seemed like forever. In real time, it had been about twelve days— but that was just an estimate, as he had no way of keeping time and no daylight to go by. He guessed that it was most likely late April or even May by now, but beyond that, he could not be sure. Time was slipping away from him; and as the days passed, the human concept of exact time began to diminish as its importance faded.
He had started doing the pushups, sit-ups, and squats to keep from going crazy. That and the practice of karate forms and technique had been a good way to expend restless energy. Kane rolled over and sat up, looking around. He was down to about half of the glow sticks and a third of the way into the dog food, even though he had tried to go
easy on it. The radio still worked, but there was no longer any radio traffic. That guy, Rick Morgan, at the emergency radio substation in Knoxville, had been the most reliable, but something had happened to him. The station had gone dark. During his last transmission, Rick had said something about not going out or they would get you. This final transmission had disturbed Kane. That was three days ago.
Kane looked over at Barney, asleep on his blanket. The dog had been whining a lot lately. Kane was beginning to think the animal’s wounded eye might have become infected. It now had an oozing yellow film that covered it. He reached over and began to rub him along his back. Barney stirred and whimpered.
“Hey, buddy, we doing alright?”
Kane exhaled and stood, closed his eyes, and took in the silence. Nothing moved in the musty darkness of the bunker, nothing but the smallest drip-drop of water into the bucket. He could not believe this was happening. Every day he went through his routine—eat, medicate, redress his wounds, work out, check and rub Barney, meditate, work out, check the radio, meditate, work out, organize and prepare the items in the shelter, and so on.
For what?
His wounds were healing well, but his days might be numbered anyway with a terminal heart condition, which he was sure had worsened since the attack. He rubbed at the pain that ached day and night. What was he going to do if he was able to leave? Where would he go? His mind swam with the dire hopelessness of the situation.