The Plague Years (Book 1): Hell is Empty and All the Devils Are Here

by Rounds, Mark

  “I could play the tired old joke about ‘I suppose you’ve all wondered why I have called this meeting’,” said an exhausted looking Lieutenant Miller, “but I won’t. The sad fact of the matter is, we have no money left to pay you. I wish there was a better way to do this, but I am going to have to ask you all to turn in your badges. I am sure most of you would continue to serve the public even without pay; In fact, several of you who came early today and volunteered to do so, but we are out of a lot of other things besides money.

  “There is very little fuel left in our underground tanks and I know most of you are on empty. We are almost completely out of ammunition. We have been issuing suspect training ammunition for two days now. Our communications are spotty at best and when the patrol cars run out of gas, those radios will go as well. We have no more spare batteries. So even if you would be willing to continue to patrol and serve, you wouldn’t have anything to patrol with.

  “Finally, all the cells at county, in the various city shops, and even our holding cells are full to bursting with infected suspects. We can’t just leave them there and I will not contemplate for a moment, shooting them. I have been a good cop for more than twenty years; I will not end my service that way so I will have one last favor to ask. I after consultation with the State Attorney General, it has been decided that all inmates will be released. I will need you to help me carry that out. We will release them one at a time. Even with every precaution we can take, there will be risk of infection so I am asking only for volunteers.

  “I won’t fault any of you who decide to leave before that sordid duty is complete. I was also asked to have you turn in your departmental weapons, but screw that. I suspect you will need them as many of you will go on serving the public in whatever way you can. After we get all the prisoners we have locally safely released, we will impound and disable the departmental vehicles and then we will use a commandeered school bus to get you all home. I will spread out what little ammunition we have left. I will also issue the remaining supplies, medical and otherwise, though I don’t think many of you will have much use for copier paper, which seems to be what we have the most of.

  “It has been an honor and a privilege to serve with you. I hope we meet again under better circumstances.”

  May 28th, Thursday, 6:02pm EDT.

  Macklin had hidden in the alley for most of the day. He was beginning to ache from many small wounds and abrasions suffered from the explosion and collapse of the ceiling of his office building. He could still see the building and it was still standing and apparently structurally sound. The emergency response was sparse as it was limited to one engine company and a few police cars. One ambulance came and went but paramedics and bystanders were still caring for many of the injured in the streets. Macklin had seen data that said most hospitals were full to overflowing with the infected and that most cities, Washington, DC included, had opened large buildings like schools and sports arenas to house them. The care was getting more and more haphazard as the temporary facilities became overcrowded and medical professionals became scarce. Care in many facilities had actually failed and the patients had revolted in much the same manner as they had in the Tri-Cities.

  He didn’t know what he to do. He had little in the way of food or survival supplies at his home, even if he could get there, as he spent most of his time on the road, living out of a suitcase. One thing he had done just as soon as he left his work place was throw his ‘special’ cell phone as far as he could out into the Potomac River. He had spent most of the day alternately racked with guilt and filled with rage. He knew, now, he had been used and then thrown away like old toilet paper.

  It was getting dark and he had seen infected people roaming around. He wasn’t sure where he could sleep safely and didn’t want to go anywhere official because he was afraid of being connected to the destruction of the building. He had no food. He had, after the last time he was stranded, stocked up on all the ammunition for his service weapon that he had at home, all fifty-seven rounds of it. Since he could carry no briefcase today, this was about all he had save for a couple of Clif bars in his pocket. He was edging toward a door that looked open, hoping to find a small room he could barricade for the night when he spotted a familiar, black, late model Chevy Suburban in the alley behind him.

  He looked around but there was no other exit so he ran for the door of the building he had been casing and slammed into it. He grasped at the lever that would open the door and pressed down hard, only to find that while the door looked slightly gapped and open, the lock was still intact.

  Two large men in black tactical gear wearing opaque face shields with MP-5’s on slings got out of the rear doors and caught up to Macklin before he could escape down the alley.

  Macklin tried to bolt past one but he proved to be fast as well as large and grabbed Macklin’s left arm and twisted it into a classic come along hold and without a word crab walked him back to the Suburban.

  The other opened the passenger side door of the Suburban to reveal his ‘Boss.’ This man had never given Macklin a name and now the mere fact that he was nameless made this moment even more terrifying.

  “Throwing your phone away was a useless gesture,” said the man in the driver’s seat. “We had you chipped like a pet dog. All we had to do was drive around until the transponder beeped. You didn’t even go very far from your crime.”

  “It was your crime,” said Macklin accusingly. “You had me dancing like a puppet on a string.”

  “Oh, we have it all on the feed from surveillance cameras in the building and can pin it on you any time we like,” said the man in the driver’s seat chuckling slightly as he motioned Macklin to take the seat next to him. The man behind him released his arm. Macklin thought briefly of fleeing but he realized that the other goon was behind them covering him quite professionally with his MP-5. He had nowhere else to go.

  “Raise your arms,” said the first man. Macklin complied and was quickly relieved of his pistol and spare ammunition.

  “You will be pleased to hear,” said the man in the driver’s seat, “that your recent colleague, Assistant Director Erickson, survived the blast. It seems that a falling beam formed a shelter for him. He was buried in ceiling tiles and other office debris, but he is fine. He didn’t even have to leave the site for medical care. With the file that popped up on his computer shortly after he logged in about an hour ago, he will have everything he needs to have you put in jail until you rot or become infected and then rot.”

  “You bastard!” snarled Macklin.

  “My parents’ relationships are none of your concern. But remember this, we own you and as it happens, you have again become useful to us, as surprising as that may seem. Get in the car or my friends here will fold you up and put you in the seat. I need you alive, not healthy.”

  Macklin got in. The man behind him bagged his head so he couldn’t see and as the van took several sharp turns, Macklin became disoriented and more and more frightened. No one had spoken during the ride, no music, no radio calls, and when the van finally stopped, it was all he could do not to soil himself.

  The two large guards tumbled him out unto a concrete floor. He was inside a parking garage or mechanic’s shop because the concrete was cool and there were bits of oil, brake fluid, and other nameless fluids staining the floor along with bits of gravel and the other detritus that comes from parking cars in a building. The two men easily grabbed him under the arms and carried him. His attempts to walk or change directions were easily frustrated by a third man who was a master with a baton. After a couple sharp blows to his calves and ankles, he stopped resisting.

  After a few minutes, he was unceremoniously dumped onto the ground. His hood was ripped off and he was bathed in very intense light from the headlights of several parked cars that formed a circle in what appeared to be the back of a parking garage. He tried to look up but the lights were blinding after the time spent in a dark hood.

  “Macklin,” said a voice he knew only
as his ‘Boss’. “Stay still and listen to my entire question and then answer truthfully. If you lie, you will be left dead and naked in this parking garage. What do you know about Chad Strickland and his family?”

  “Um, he is a statistician and a GIS expert for Bechtel,” said Macklin playing for a little time to remember every fact he could about Strickland. “He is a black belt in karate and was an enlisted intelligence analyst while he was in the service. Um … he has a wife and two kids, he likes fast cars …”

  “It’s clear,” said a voice Macklin had never heard before, “he knows something about the person who is shielding the one of the ‘Chosen.’ Ask about her!”

  “Very well,” said Macklin’s ‘Boss.’ “What do you know about Amber Hoskins?”

  “Um …” Macklin was really thrashing this time, and then he remembered. “She’s a Sherriff’s Deputy, one of the first LEO’s to be attacked in the Kennewick area. I questioned her and so did the folks at Bechtel. She was bit by an infected girl in a traffic stop gone wrong.”

  And on and on; Macklin was bombarded with questions asking about where the Stricklands lived, who they knew, who was the Highway Patrol Sergeant that kept showing up around her? Some of the answers he knew, others he did not but he was mindful of the charge not to lie so he told only the truth and was candid about what he didn’t know.

  The last question came after what seemed like an eternity of questioning but probably only lasted forty-five minutes.

  “Do you know any way to get to Strickland?” said his ‘Boss.’ “Friends we could hold or family members?”

  “There was the corporate attorney,” said a panicky Macklin, “a guy with two last names, Clinton Taylor. He and Strickland were close and Taylor is an asshole lawyer; a real hard case. He had a couple of divorces and one estranged son. He will be by himself and easy to take down.”

  “I have heard enough,” said a third voice. “He knows too much to let live unless we ‘induct’ him. He also appears to know enough to help us with this Strickland character and get one of our own back.”

  Macklin’s boss nodded to the two guards who picked up Macklin and slammed him up against the wall. One pulled a razor sharp Randal Model 12 Raymond Thorpe Bowie Knife and split Macklin’s shirt and jacket sleeve up to the shoulder while the other expertly pinned him to the wall and held his arm in place. The knife wielding guard then sheathed the knife and took a Pharmajet Needle Free Injector and pressed it against Macklin’s arm. Macklin tried to twist away but it felt like his arm was in a vise.

  The injection was quick and almost painless. Then the guard let Macklin go and he slumped down into a sitting position cradling his arm.

  “What have you done to me!” said Macklin dreading the answer.

  “Don’t be an ass,” said his ‘Boss.’ “If we wanted you dead, you would be. It would have been far easier. No, what we have done is start you down the path to full membership in our little group. That injection contains the ‘Zombie Plague’ virus as the press calls it.”

  “I’m gonna die then,” said Macklin, resignation coloring his voice.

  “Again, don’t be an ass,” said Macklin’s ‘Boss’ rolling his eyes, “as I said, if we wanted you dead, it would have been much easier just to shoot you. Given these troubled times; your body would probably have been eaten by the infected in this nearly abandoned parking garage before it was discovered. No, we have a treatment regime for the infected that can be of use to us. Every day, there will be another injection. As long as you behave, you will get your medicine.

  “Let me describe what will happen if you leave our employment for any reason. We will of course stop your treatments. In two or three days, you will become feverish and start hallucinating. The hunger will start and you will eat anything to staunch it. In a week or perhaps two if you are naturally resistant, you will likely be fully involved, mostly naked, wandering the streets, eating anything that vaguely resembles food. If you can find enough calories, you will keep living but you will have less and less lucid thought. What thoughts you will have will be controlled by us. So let me make this perfectly clear, we own you. Before this point, it was just threats to your position and wellbeing that kept you in line, now the fear of losing of your mind will be enough.”

  “So I’ll be taking this stuff forever?” asked a horror stricken Macklin.

  “No, not at all,” said his ‘Boss’ with an evil smile. “The longer you have the disease, the higher doses of medication you will need to retain your mind. If you cease to provide good, ever increasing value, you will no longer be cost effective from our viewpoint and we will just turn you out. On the other hand, if you have a natural resistance to the pathogen, all we need to do is wait. You will become one of the Chosen. That is one or at most two percent of the sufferers out there. If you don’t have the genetic heritage to survive you could still get lucky as four or five percent of the infected become carriers. They have the disease and are contagious, but they retain some or all of their sanity. They can hear the Chosen call and many actually have some degree of lucidity.”

  “Then aren’t you afraid of me, of getting infected,” asked a now thoroughly shaken Macklin.

  “Oh no,” said one of the faceless men who faced him. “We, all of us here, are the Chosen and we were infected long ago and survived.”

  May 29th, Friday, 10:08 am PDT.

  Chad woke up to an empty bed. One of the many little hardships he had to endure was sleeping alone these days. It wasn’t that his wife didn’t want his company, but they had both agreed that there should be one adult up at all times in the house. Mary was a natural night owl so she had volunteered to take the graveyard shift and let Chad and Heather sleep. With Chad’s early morning habits, he appreciated the reprieve but he did miss her. With a groan, he got up and got dressed. City water service had stopped last night and they had started rationing their water so no shower this morning. Then he wandered, yawning into the kitchen to find his wife had already prepared coffee, eggs, sausage, potatoes, and toast.

  “Thanks for letting me sleep late but who is watching the fort?” asked Chad as he sat down.

  “Connor couldn’t sleep,” said Mary. “Amy is sitting up with him.”

  “Aren’t we on tight rations?” asked Chad looking at the farmer sized breakfast in front of him.

  “Dave, Heather, and I talked last night while you were sleeping,” said Mary. “Our gasoline consumption is still too high and we stopped getting natural gas from the utilities again last night. We will be spending the next day or two either preserving everything we have that requires refrigeration or eating it up.”

  “I suspect I will look at this meal fondly in a week or two,” said Chad sadly. “That was a good call though. Where is Dave anyway?”

  “On the roof with his cannon,” said Mary.

  “I thought he didn’t have the duty this morning,” said Chad. They had worked out a watch roster that had at least one of the combat trained adults, Chris, Chad, Amber, or Dave on watch and it was Chad’s turn.

  “Another squirrelly idea we had from that impromptu meeting last night,” said Mary. “We are burning through a lot of ammo, especially shotgun ammo. Chris has an RCB reloading press and a number of dies at his apartment along with some components. He figured that if you guys made a run to his place today, they could bring that equipment here and reload a bunch of the shells we have burned through. He figured that since the bad guys seem to know we are here, he probably doesn’t have to stay away from his place anymore.”

  “Now that is a good idea,” said Chad. “But how does that get Dave up on the roof in his bunker?”

  “Well, the kids are getting cabin fever, especially with no power so Dave has them going up and down the street, around our yards and such policing up empties.”

  “Wait,” said Chad with some alarm. “Some of the pistol and shotgun shells were handled by the infected bikers.”

  “Heather already thought of that, the kids all have glove
s and the brass is dumped into hot water with Lysol and stirred vigorously. Then they dump them out on a tarp to let them dry in the sun before they sort them.”

  “Sounds good to me then, but why is Dave on the roof?”

  “Oh that. Well, Dave is Dave and is being paranoid. He is watching the kids and guarding them. Providing top cover he calls it. It’s also something he can do. His hip is acting up again.”

  “I know,” said Chad. Dave could sometimes go weeks without a serious symptom but when he taxed the joint, like now, in combat and before, manhandling a lot of boxes and crates of supplies around, it would hurt quite a bit, and once he had even gone back to the hospital for an inflammation of the joint caused by the bits and pieces of his artificial hip wearing off and getting embedded in the surrounding tissue. His bone structure had been pretty badly torn up by the IED that had caused him to leave active service and there were still bits of metal that hadn’t been removed. What he needed and couldn’t get, was a couple of days off his feet.

  Chad continued his ruminations silently while he ate. As he finished the last of his coffee, Chris and Amber entered from the back door.

  “I don’t suppose you have another cup of that coffee,” asked Chris asked as he sat down across from Chad.

  “I do,” said Mary. “Fiona made some mixed berry scones to use up all the little bags of frozen berries we had in the freezer. Would you like one?”

  “I would, thank you,” said Amber who was right behind Chris and in fact seldom left his side. “Chris will eat most anything at a moment’s notice but Fiona has a deft hand when it comes to baking.” Then her tone got serious. “Chad we need to talk about Dave.”

  “His hip?” asked Chad.

  “Yes, while Chris was shaving, I watched him go up to his sniper’s nest on the roof. He almost couldn’t climb the ladder this morning.”

  “Did Mary tell you we are considering a run out to my place to pick up a couple of firearms, ammo and my reloading stuff?” asked Chris.