by Jesse Gagnon
“It’s Mario.”
“Not looking good down there Mario.”
“You’re right. It’s much worse out there than we expected. The team that cleared out most of the city of the Azrael still left more than me and my men can handle.” Mario sounded troubled.
“How are the weapons?”
“Put to good use. However, I managed to blow a hole in the side of a building with one of those red bolt tips.”
“I noticed.” Simon laughed. “Be careful with those things. There’s not much city left.”
“I’m trying. There are so many individual groups everywhere. Just when you take out a small herd, two more show up. One more thing…” Mario paused. “We have a casualty.”
“Who?” Simon sat up straight in his chair.
“Savanna.”
“Is she dead?”
“No, broken ankle and get this, she was bit but she’s immune.”
“She’s what?”
“Immune.”
“Lucky as hell. Only a small group have immunity. But, they usually just end up as lunch. Is she doing okay?”
“She said she knew before joining that she was immune.”
“Really? Not in her file.” Simon paused and searched for her file in the filing cabinet in his desk. “Okay, guess we can add it. How’s everyone else”
“John’s pretty beaten up by it. Thinks it’s his fault she was bit. It’s dangerous as hell down here.” Mario paused. “We’re going to need a bit of time to form up a new plan. Savanna’s got a doctor treating her, she’s in good hands.”
“Good. Bad news is that time is not on our side. The city is going to hell fast.” Simon flipped through Savanna’s file and read a few comments from their last run. “Oh, your girl picked up a stray near her building. Saved his life.”
“Taliah?”
“Yes, she must have picked up your habits.” Simon laughed.
“Is she safe?” Mario sounded concerned.
“She’s safe. I’ve made sure of that. The boy was being chased outside her building. She got his attention with a make-up mirror, lured him inside and used the Eagles Nest snipers to take out the herd in pursuit.”
“Impressive. Tactical.” Mario felt at ease.
“Then when he was followed by more inside she tossed a drawer full of silverware in the alley to draw them out shattering the window. Gave the boy the time he needed to get into the maintenance elevator.”
“Wow. She is something.” Mario smiled while nodding his head.
“That she is.” Simon stopped reading Savanna’s file. “How you holding up?”
“I’m fine. Frustrated that I can’t do more but my hands are tied.”
“I hear you. I’ll see what I can do for you. Stay put and stay safe.”
“Roger.”
Simon hung up the phone, located Savanna’s bio page within the file and added her immunity status to it. Maybe while she healed she could provide some samples to Dr. Schwinn. He decided to give the doc a call. He dialed his number. It rang four times and eventually was picked up.
“Dr. Schwinn speaking.”
“Hey doc, it’s Simon.”
“Oh Simon, how have you been?”
“You know how I’m doing.” Simon put both elbows on the desk and massaged his face as if he were trying to rub out the stress.
“Trying not to pull out the rest of your hair?”
“What hair?” The two shared a good laugh.
“Glad to hear you haven’t lost your sense of humor. Did you hear about Taliah?”
“Yes, Timothy told me.”
“Forever the information gatherer. He’s good to have around.”
“I know, I’ve got good people.”
“You do and they will follow you to their grave. You know that right?”
“Yes, unfortunately, I know all too well the sacrifices my people make every day.” Simon twisted his seat around and scooted his rolling chair closer to the window and looked outside. “It’s getting bad out there.”
“We’ll come back from this Simon. You have to know that.” Dr. Schwinn assured sounding optimistic, always the optimist.
“I don’t know.” He paused a few seconds. “Savanna was bit.”
“She what?”
“She’s been bit but she’s still okay. She’s immune.”
Dr. Schwinn paused for a few seconds. “I know.”
“You did?” Simon examined the phone as if it were alive.
“She came to me about her immunity a year or so ago. We ran some tests but the virus mutated so often we couldn’t develop a working antivirus.” He sounded discouraged.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” Simon grimaced.
“She wanted to stay out in the field. She liked John.”
“I know, she does. He’s taking her getting bit pretty hard.” Simon wrapped the phone cord around his finger.
“I bet he is. He wouldn’t have known she was immune.”
“Unless she told him. The sound of his reaction, he didn’t.”
“Look, don’t worry so much about your team. They will be okay. Focus on a solution. That’s what you’re good at. I have to get going. Taliah wants me to meet the young man she saved. I think she likes him.”
“Okay. Be safe doc. Don’t say anything to Mario about her liking anyone. He’ll go ballistic.”
“I won’t say anything. You take care of yourself too Simon.” Dr. Schwinn hung up the phone.
Chapter 13
A Twisted Mind
After long hours of hunting, eating and pursuing the humans and defect Azrael, David’s mind was exhausted. He knew that his body would make progress as he slept. It didn’t require his mind to do its job. At times he believed that what he thought transferred to the body. However, with multiple decisions made beyond his control, he knew that he was in fact only a spectator in the game of death. He eventually surrendered to a deep sleep.
A world beyond his own entered his mind and redesigned the environment the way his subconscious desired. It was the only place where he had control over his body, well an imaginary one. Dogs barked in the distance. They were the neighbor’s dogs. He was in his house, in the basement. It was dark. He could smell blood, human feces and pungent body odors.
“Why are you doing this?” A pretty woman cried out to him. He turned to see her strapped to an operating table. A small table nearby housed multiple cutting tools including power tools. A man yelled at him.
“You’re a sick man. You’re fucking crazy!” The man squirmed being shackled to the wall near the young woman. A name on his shirt was illegible. Instantly David was inches from the man, whispering into his ear.
“You’re next.” He kissed his cheek.
“Don’t fucking touch me! Help!!! Somebody help!!!” He yelled out. The woman joined in.
“Help!” Her eyes searched for the man chained. “Cooper? Help!!! Please somebody!”
David pointed his fingers in the air as if he was conducting an orchestra.
“Scream, Call out to your friends. I love it. They aren’t coming for you. What’s Cooper going to do?” David pointed a knife at him while looking at the woman with an inquisitive gaze. “No one is coming. Maybe death?” David maintained his gaze at the woman. She was horrified, turned away and continued to scream. He laughed and danced around to music that didn’t exist.
He turned on the circular saw on the table and revved the throttle of it. It sang to him. She began to scream hysterically. He picked it up. Placed it carefully over the woman’s left thigh and slowly dropped it. It dug in sluggishly and violently. Flesh and blood sprayed the floor next to the table. Once it hit bone it skipped a bit, but he applied more force and it eventually cut through. The sound of bone grinding and smoking excited David. She screamed even louder as he pushed past the marrow and exited the back of her leg. It was music to his ears. The man hollered for help once again revealing veins in his neck indicating the strain. This was his world. A world he knew before
the Azrael.
The woman was crying now, calling for her Mommy. He calmly walked over to the other side, pulling the cord attached to the saw with his foot, and started the saw again. It whined like a finely tuned instrument. He gently dropped the saw on her right thigh. She screamed again until finally surrendering to the pain and passed out.
“Aww, no more screaming.” He stopped cutting and had to wiggle the saw and start and stop it a bit to pull it free. He wanted her to be awake for what came next.
He heard noises of bumping, shattering and movement upstairs. “No one should be here.” He thought out loud.
Ahh, yeah that’s when it happened.
The door to the basement flung open and a group of wild bloodied men descended the stairs. At the time he didn’t know what they were. David feared nothing. One of them bit into the man that was chained to the wall and tore out chunks of his face and neck. The man cried out. Two more dove on top of the young woman and began to feed on her already mutilated body. It upset him.
“Hey, wait! She’s mine!” He shouted and picked up a large knife and stabbed them multiple times in their backs. They ignored the affront and continued to feed. Why couldn’t he stop them? He was a massive man. He picked one of them up by the back of the neck and tossed it on the ground. It snarled at him and lunged back on top of the woman who awoke being eaten alive. She cried out for a few moments and suddenly stopped. Both the man and the woman were quiet. David checked for the woman’s pulse. She was dead. It angered him.
“You killed her. She was mine.” He picked up a machete and cleaved one of the crazy men’s head off. That worked, he thought. The other one sneered and sprung at David. It bit into his arm. He pulled it off and twisted its neck hard snapping the spine. He tossed the crazed man to the ground and the other one that sunk its teeth into the man chained continued in unafraid and bit into David’s leg. He kicked it away and pinned it down on all fours with one hand on the back of the head while his other hand held its back down. He removed his grip on its head, grabbed his machete and cut off its skull with one powerful swing. It fell lifeless.
The man on the wall started to move as did the woman only minutes later. Their eyes opened and were gray and wild like the other crazy men. He started to stagger and collapsed to a knee. The virus commenced its first stage. His heartbeat began to increase speed. Everything fell into darkness.
David awoke with blood on his face and the aroma of intestines on his fingers. He tried to move them, but couldn’t. He’s back in the Azrael world or was this the dream world? It didn’t matter; death was everywhere and in everything. He observed Riley and Cooper. Cooper, he looked at him. He was double the size of the man from his dream, but it was him. Scarring on his wrists and ankles indicated the shackles that were once digging into him. Once his prisoner now is a comrade in the game of death. David smiled in his mind but his body did not. He wondered how Riley came to be. His memories were fading from him these days. If his name wasn’t on his work blouse than he wouldn’t even know who he was either. Dreams provided him with clues to his past, to his memories. He enjoyed dreaming. He enjoyed being in control. The defects were in control. He didn’t like that. He wouldn’t admit that he was envious of their control. They had reacquired mind to body connection. He saw it in their eyes. However, his hate for the defects have somehow transferred to his body. His body hunts defects, hunts its own kind. Maybe his blinding hatred arcs over the break in connection and feeds into his body’s primal urge to attack.
David’s mouth continued to chew on something rubbery. As his teeth finally broke into the resiliency of the gristly organ, he tasted shit. Yup, he was eating intestines. He hated intestines. He looked at the body where the long flimsy organs came from and noticed a fat man, already dead from a gunshot to the head. How was this man fat in a world like this? He searched the area. The shelves were stocked with years full of food that could have fed a small town. He was by himself, a defect from society. He hated him. He wanted him to suffer more. His body ripped the intestines from its mouth and grabbed the dead corpse by its throat and dug its fingers into the skin. David’s body tossed him across the room. It continued its assault on the man, punching, kicking and pulling him apart until parts of the cadaver were littering the entire room. The other Azrael came over and licked the walls. They scraped pieces of flesh off of everything around him and scooped it into their greedy mouths.
His hatred fueled and guided his body to act. He faintly remembered doing this before, leading his body to attack guided by rage. Had he figured this out before? Did he forget that this was a link to a type of control? He couldn’t remember. Who was he? He thought again. His eyes grew wild in search of a visual cue of who he was. ‘David Palmer’. He read his nameplate that dangled on his blouse. It was severely worn and could fall off at any moment. He worried that if it fell off he’d lose who he was and maybe all pieces of what he was in life. Did that matter?
David looked up and saw Riley and Cooper licking up pieces of the man off of the walls. He remembered their names with no problem. A daydream image and memory of some doctor flickered in his vision.
“You suffered a severe brain injury. It’s amazing that you survived.” A doctor admitted looking into David’s eyes. He was pulled back to reality instantly and the doctor disappeared. His body was sprinting through the woods following Cooper and Riley. The hunt, they were on the hunt again. He sniffed the air. He could smell humans in the breeze.
His body found a house in the woods. The aroma of dead humans covered the place. Most Azrael dislike the taste of already dead meat. David’s body and his Azrael will eat dead people. They will survive. You need to feed to survive. They entered the house and found a large dead man lying on his stomach with intestines wrapped around his neck. Looks like someone else hates intestines too. He laughed to himself. A hollowed out woman was on a table while her innards were scattered across the floor. Cooper and Riley were already eating the flesh and guts on the ground. David wanted to bite into the woman. He wanted to see what the dead woman tasted like. Her face was beautiful, but lifeless. Her eyes had already rotted out. He wondered what color they were. His body ignored the woman and pulled a skinny bearded man that laid lifeless on the bed to its jaws and bit into him. The flesh was sour and the meat was rancid. However, there were valuable nutrients still left within the cadaver. He desired fresher meat. He desired to find more humans to eat. Where were they? Not out here. The city! His body continued to feed as David’s mind raced about Chicago and about defect Azrael. He thought about Cooper. He thought about his own name and his eyes looked down and he saw the name plate. David Palmer. His name was David Palmer.
Chapter 14
Winging It
Muffled screams, gunshots and broken glass stirred the occupants of the lobby. Mario hoped the other floors would have barricaded themselves in better. He felt that this was his fault, a repeat of a failed mission back in Syria where his entire team died. It’s been a few hours since they arrived. Savanna was already out from the medication the doctor gave her and John was sitting at her side.
Movement in the corner of his eye drew him to the window. He walked over calmly as to not alarm the residents. He glanced down at the pavement below and a man was lying there, dead on impact. Blood steadily expanded and pooled beneath his body. Three more bodies dropped in front of Mario, startling him, and struck violently on the pavement below next to the man. It looked like a woman and two children followed the man to their deaths. It reminded him of 9/11, when people chose death by falling than by burning. He turned away and noticed other people from the lobby gathered near the window as well. They watched in horror inspiring most to quietly mourn the deaths of the family. It is likely that they knew who they were. He knew that he needed to do something fast. It was only a matter of time before more floors fell victim to the Azrael attacks. He needed to get them out of the building and find a way to seal up that hole, if it was possible. He walked over to Jason and grabbed his atte
ntion.
“About time. Let’s go out there and bitch slap some Azrael.” Jason insisted and grabbed his gear.
“I don’t have a solid plan yet. Not sure we have time to make one. We’re going to have to wing it.”
“Winging it is fine by me. What about the others?”
“John needs to be with Savanna. I’m sure these people are safe with John watching over them. He won’t let anything happen to his woman. I’ve seen that first hand.” Mario shook his head. “Just not sure how to tell him.”
“Let me give it a shot.”
“You sure?”
“No, I’ll wing it.” They laughed and Mario started to gather his things. Jason managed to talk it over with John and he understood. Mario and Jason headed for the door.
“Where are they going? Where are you going? Don’t leave us!” The ugly woman from earlier appeared even uglier at that moment. She pleaded walking over towards them. She was frightened and for a good reason.
“We’re heading outside to see if we can stop this from getting out of hand.” Mario gestured to the building. “If we don’t stop it now then we’ll have one big nasty herd banging on our door.”
“Well, what if they come for us while you’re gone?” She continued.
“John’s staying behind. He’s one tough son of a bitch. Seen him tackle a guy out of a two story window. He’ll do anything for that woman.” Mario pointed towards Savanna sleeping peacefully. “When I leave, he’s in charge. He’ll keep you alive. I promise.” Mario caught John’s eyes and winked. John smiled and returned his attention back to Savanna.
“Need me to relay anything to the other floors?” The soldier asked.
“Tell them to stay quiet. We’ve got a plan to pull them away.”
“Roger that. I’ll let them know.”
“Make sure you guys place this furniture the exact way it is situated right now. A poor barricade will get you all killed and that’s a guarantee.” Mario poked the soldier on his chest. “Don’t worry Private, I’ve left you in good hands. John’s killed more of these things than is in the building right now.” That was a lie. He didn’t know how many Azrael John’s killed or how many were in the building. What he did know was that confidence in your chain of command produces better soldiers.