Born of Chaos

by Jeff DeMarco

  His eyes remained mesmerized by her as her image faded into a concrete room. There stood a small boy with tattered clothes and a thick metal collar. His dirty feet shuffled around the room, waiting. ‘For what?’ he wondered. ‘Death?’ There were more now, their eyes dejected, cast down at the floor, their dirty feet shuffling from side to side.

  He was there, but they wouldn’t look at him, wouldn’t make eye contact. One by one, he shook them, trying to pull them out of their zombie-like trance, as their presence grew. He was surrounded, in the tiny concrete room, struggling for air, struggling to move. He lifted his head towards the ceiling and screamed!

  He woke in a cold sweat, his heart thumping out of his chest. He remembered the dream, remembered everything, but couldn’t make sense of it. It was 5pm now and he exited the plane. The runway was barren, no planes, no vehicles. He started off east, on foot.

  CHAPTER 11

  “I hear the choppers hovering,” The words rang through the headsets of all aircraft, an old Army marching cadence. “They’re hovering overheeeead.” The helicopter squadron was made up of three AH-64 Apache Longbow attack helicopters, conducting a joint exercise at Naval Base San Diego when the virus hit, three AH-1 Cobra attack helicopters, four CH-53E Super Stallions heavy-lift helicopters and three UH-1Iroqouis troop carriers. “They come to get the wounded!” The vocalist, a lone Army Special Forces operator, ‘Viking 9,’ was in attendance at Basic Underwater Demolition/ SEAL training in San Diego when the virus broke out. “They come to get the Deeeeeead!” Seated in front of him, Brie grinned wide as she realized he was the one singing. “Airbooo ooo ooo ooorn Navyyyy yyyy leads the way!” They were en route north, passing above major cities.

  Other aircraft radioed in with hoots and hollers for the tune; others had squealed in a high-pitched tone, “But what about Special Forces?” Then a deep, gravelly voice responded, “Fuck Special Forces!” imitating a popular online video. They had rescued thirty, from Carlsbad to Huntington Beach, fresh sea air and the peaceful Pacific to their port side.

  “Here!” Brie shouted over the radio, pointing the pilot down to a Long Beach rooftop. Three aircraft lowered to a group of desperate people, holed up in a large high rise.

  Viking 9 was the first off, his bearded face covered by a black and tan kaffir scarf, his weapon slung to his body armor, now drawn - pointed out to the edge of the building. Other operators followed to overwatch. The two-man flight crew directed the civilians, shoving and yelling to the other aircraft, their ramps lowered and waiting.

  Brie stepped out, her mind in the distance. She felt something… odd. A strange sensation, a scent, something… new.

  The other aircraft filled with passengers and took off, leaving a slew of civilians still on the rooftop. They pressed in towards Brie’s helicopter, pushed back by special operators.

  Brie reached out and felt the odd presence move towards her. Her mind ripped from it, as an arm grabbed her, the barrel of a .38 revolver pressed to her temple.

  “I’m getting on that goddamn chopper!” The man’s eyes were wild.

  “There’s more coming!” Viking yelled. “Let her go.”

  Brie was frantic and terrified as her mind searched for an action.

  “Move!” The man pressed the weapon in tighter.

  Her eyes wide, she looked at Viking.

  He mouthed the words, ‘DON’T MOVE.’ A single suppressed shot and the man dropped dead to the roof.

  She scrambled in towards Viking. He put his arm around her and lifted her back into the helicopter. As two other aircraft landed, he spun his hand in a circle, telling the others, ‘let’s go!’

  “I don’t want her going out on your missions anymore.” Mrs. Nguyen’s tone was hushed, but angry, still audible from the kitchen.

  “Without her,” Commander Nguyen whispered, “there is no mission; there is no rescue; we lose. Humanity loses.”

  “She’s not a tool…” She folded her arms with a contemptuous glare. “Or some seaman you can order around. She’s a little girl.”

  “You think I don’t know that?” His voice grew steadily more irritated. “You act as if I’m the one giving the orders. It was her idea.”

  Brie sat in the dining room. “You know I can hear you guys, right?”

  Mrs. Nguyen poked her head out the doorway. “Sorry, honey.” She smiled. “Just a difference of opinion.”

  “Never mind.” Brie stood, turned towards her bedroom, while rolling her eyes. “Have your difference of opinion.”

  She lay on her bed, her mind tuning out her caretakers, her foster parents, her… ‘whatever,’ she thought. She turned inward, the song, Viking 9, the man with the gun, and something else. Even now she could feel it, the presence; its change in course moved steadily towards her. She felt both one and many; its nature, its mind shielded from her.

  “Can you honestly tell me that you trust her?” Commander Nguyen whispered.

  “With our support, our guidance, our love…” Mrs. Nguyen’s eyes conveyed a significance, an importance. “I think she’ll do the right thing.”

  “I may have been a little harsh yesterday,” Dustin said. He drove the Humvee outside the wire with Erica in the passenger seat.

  “A little?” She sat with her arms folded, staring out the window. They were outside the wire now; the windswept fields, tan and brown with dry grass, the sky grey and colder as the days passed. Workers scoured the crops, picking the fall harvest of beans, cucumbers, leeks and spinach; those crops that had survived the Oklahoma drought. Soldiers surrounded the fields, eyes watchful for movement in the surrounding forest and fields.

  Sitting on a strap in the ring mount turret of the Humvee, Ari listened intently, eyes scanning the tree line.

  “I want you to be your own person.” The engine revved, as he drove up the edge of a steep embankment. “Just for you to be safe, too.”

  “I killed over a thousand of them with my bare hands.” Her eyes remained fixed in the distance. “I’ll be fine.”

  He looked at her, studying her with a frown. “And then you decided to drown yourself.”

  “I’m over it,” she whispered.

  He stopped the Humvee, looked at her. “I’ve been there. You’re never just ‘over it.’ You can’t erase the scars, but you can learn to live with them.”

  “Hi, pot.” She gave him an antagonistic smirk. “I’m kettle.”

  He sighed and shook his head. “I want you to live a better life than I did. I spent a lot of years hating myself.” He shifted slowly from brake to accelerator. “I would do anything if it meant you wouldn’t have to feel this way.”

  “Like being a dick,” she mumbled.

  He swallowed the lump in his throat. “It hurts that you don’t call me dad anymore.”

  A regretful, but combative look crept across her face.

  His lips pursed. “I never said I was good at this fatherhood thing.”

  They pulled up to a Humvee, where a line of hungry soldiers and workers lined up for chow. First Sergeant Hawk stood at the front, squeezing out hand sanitizer as they passed, scooping spoonful’s from green marmites on the tailgate of his Humvee. Part of the Choctaw tribe, as Dustin had learned; native to the area, he embraced modern culture yet held on to his roots. Hawk had left the reservation when he was just 18 years old and had chosen to be a 13B, cannon crewmember; that would keep him close to Fort Sill, close to his family. He had seen much of the world. From his second station in Germany, he saw much of Europe; then South Korea, the Middle East and much of the continental US.

  Dustin walked over and stared down into the trays of food; he no longer felt hungry. “What is this?”

  “Cream of okra, I think,” Hawk said. “I’m told it’s edible. Haven’t confirmed that, yet.”

  Dustin grimaced. “Gonna be a lean winter. We’re going hunting, you want to- “

  “Hey!” a worker yelled, shoved out of the line for chow. He ducked his head, put his shoulder into a Soldier, knocked h
im against the Humvee.

  The Soldier grappled with him, bucked him into the dirt, as Dustin and First Sergeant Hawk each collided with them. “Let go!” The Soldier’s arms were pinned to his sides in Dustin’s grip, and he fumbled for his weapon.

  The worker ceased to struggle; Hawk loosened his grip on the man.

  “Settle down!” Dustin tried pulling the Soldier’s hand from the rifle.

  Hawk flipped the safety off his rifle; the muzzle was raised an inch from the Soldier’s face. “Captain Freeman said settle down,” Hawk whispered. “Recommend taking his advice.”

  “I know you…” Dustin took the Soldiers rifle from him. “Don’t I?”

  The Soldier looked down at the dirt, fumbling into an awkward position of attention. “Colorado, Sir.”

  “Ya...” Dustin eyed the kid closer now, normal looking if not for his big ears sticking outside his crooked helmet. “…I remember you.” He handed the weapon over to Hawk. “Transfer him to the labor force, two weeks.” Dustin spun, starting off for the Humvee. He stopped. “And First Sergeant Hawk… Smoke him.”

  “Front leaning rest position…” Hawk yelled in cadence. “Move!”

  The young Soldier looked at him cockeyed.

  Hawk smiled a wide sarcastic grin. “On your face, Soldier… pushups.”

  Dustin climbed up onto the hood of the Humvee. “Listen here!” He waited for eyes and ears of the group. “Listen good… defense or labor, medical, military, builders or childcare… Doesn’t matter. One doesn’t make you better than the rest, having a gun doesn’t make you better. Without labor, no food; without builders, no shelter. Without military, no security. If one group fails, make no mistake, we will die. Work together…” He looked down at the Soldier staring back at him, his face in the dirt. “… and get in line, like everyone else.”

  They drove to the first trap, a cargo net fixed to a deadfall suspended from a tree. Dustin had soaked a cut of raw meat in a diluted mixture of fentanyl and crushed up painkillers. The opiate would serve to keep any prey still, within the trap.

  A hunter wriggled inside the net, disoriented from the drug. Its arms and legs dangled from the breaks in the netting. Ari took aim. The rifle made a ‘plunk’ as the dart left the barrel.

  Dustin cut the rope above the deadfall. The creature’s body thudded into the dirt. They bound its arms and legs in parachute chord, a length of branch stuffed across its open jaws, held in place with duct tape.

  They lashed the creature to the roof of the Humvee and moved on to the next position.

  CHAPTER 12

  “Psst.” Collin opened the tent flap, slipping a backpack off his shoulder. He heard a woman’s voice groan from inside, a lingering mixture of chemical and bile scented the interior.

  A man poked his head out, his clothes dirty, his hair unkempt and mangy. “You get it?” His eyes were desperate and shifting.

  Collin reached into his backpack, pulled out one of many sandwich bags; a tannish brown substance littered the bottom.

  “That’s all?” Disappointment filled in his voice.

  “Sorry, man. That’s all I could find.” Collin looked past him, the woman writhing on the ground, groaning, sweating underneath a sleeping bag.

  “I’m coming, baby.” The man reached into a corner, unzipped a baggie – a metal spoon, syringe and cotton balls.

  “She gonna be alright?” Collin whispered.

  He pulled a small portion of the substance, set it into a concoction inside the spoon, heating it with a lighter. “Withdrawls,” he mumbled, the syringe clamped in his lips. “She was close this time.”

  A shudder went up his spine, the prospect of death hung heavy in the rotten air. He moved on to the next tent.

  “Right here.” LaCross, Washington; Cole pointed to a farmhouse off Willow Creek Road; it was painted red and white like a barn, an old tin roof above.

  Captain Rivers tossed a chemical light out the window, a signal to the other vehicles to turn, in the moonlit darkness. They stopped at a barbed wire fence, hastily constructed from materials on hand.

  “Should I run it over?” Rivers asked, inching forward.

  Cole put his hand up, as if to say, ‘stop.’ He stepped out of the Humvee. “Hello!”

  No answer.

  He yelled again, “Hello!” and once again, waited. He reached inside, a man and his family, and another family, and another; all were bound together in the single house, the presence of a hunter inside; something inhuman outside, too. ‘I know you’re in there,’ his mind whispered to one of the men. ‘Come on out… we won’t hurt you.’

  Moments later, the door burst open. A man, shotgun in hand, fired into the air. “Get off my property!”

  “Whoa, old timer.” Captain Rivers held his palms open, to show he wasn’t a threat. He signaled the Sergeant in the vehicle behind with a nod, then looked back at the man. “You ok? Do you need any medical assistance, food, water?”

  “You heard me!” The old man fired again. “I said get!”

  “There’s something inside,” Cole whispered.

  Second Platoon circled around the fence line, performed a breech, cutting the barbed wire, and flanked the rear of the house. They split into two, lined up along the sides. “Put the weapon down!” Lieutenant Rogers screamed.

  The man looked left, then right - weapons drawn on him, presumably aimed at his head.

  Sergeant First Class Stover walked up, slowly placed his hand on the firearm.

  The man’s hands, shaking as they gripped, then finally succumbed.

  “We’re not here to hurt you,” Stover whispered, handing the weapon back to his squad leader.

  Lieutenant Rogers rushed in, tackled him to the ground. “Give me some cuffs!” he yelled.

  They swarmed inside the house, weapons drawn; its occupants put face down on the ground.

  Captain Rivers and Cole were the last inside. They walked over the occupants, zip tied and flat on their stomachs. It was an older farmhouse, quaint even, with lace curtains and knit doilies, small figurines of farm animals displayed proudly on the mantle.

  They walked into the kitchen. “There.” Cole pointed to the kitchen table, resting on the bare wooden floor. He grabbed a chair, then another, then the table - moved it to the side. A latch set into the floor.

  “Don’t do it!” the old man yelled.

  Rivers pulled the wooden slat open, shined his light down into the darkness, a shuffle stirred the silence.

  It burst from the floor, knocking Rivers to his back.

  The team converged on the kitchen.

  It stood, poised to strike. Sensing the overwhelming force, it dove through the kitchen window.

  The man shimmied to his knees, then his feet; sprinted after it, screaming, “Kelsey! Stop!”

  The Marines pursued, leaving the house uncovered, but for Rivers and Cole.

  The Hunter, ‘Kelsey,’ hid behind a row of large boulders, masked by the darkness. Her father ran ahead, his hands still pinned behind his back. “Kelsey!” he yelled into the darkness. “Come home!” He passed alongside the row of boulders and “Uhhh,” his body was yanked to the dirt. Silence and blood spray, as her razor touch sliced through his spine; his body was alive, but immobile.

  Marines spread out, scanning the darkness with night vision. “Contact!” a squad leader called out, firing round after round at the hunter.

  “No!” the father yelled. His fresh blood coated his daughter’s jaws. “Just leave her be!” Her head ducked down, slicing into his chest, breaking ribs, puncturing organs; he felt everything.

  The Marines pressed on, firing shots into the Hunter’s chest and head.

  “No.” His voice was faint now; red foam filled his mouth. “Just leave… her be.”

  A medic moved up from the rear; the father’s eyes now closed. He pressed his fingers to his neck, looked up at Sergeant First Class Stover and shook his head.

  Inside, Cole felt the dead and the living. He also listened to the
conversation between Rogers and Stover; a heart to heart. A – ‘Hey Sir, you gotta chill out, before you get someone killed.’ He felt something else, too. A wisp of movement. No thoughts, but energy was moving towards them at an alarming rate. He had experienced this feeling before, but never so close.

  Rogers stepped out the front door and onto the porch, his ‘butt – hurt’ lingered from his talk with Sergeant Stover. He heard a faint ‘Thump thump… Thump thump,’ and flipped his night vision down over his eyes. He watched: a plume of dust rose over the hill, something moving in the distance; a wide arc revealed a four-legged creature, almost mechanical in stride. It came about gradually, now half the distance in seconds. He raised his rifle, his last words, “What the f-“

  The creature tore into him, its four legs penetrated his armor, its teeth ripped into his neck, tore out the trachea and spat it to the dirt. It moved, silent and agile to the rear of the house.

  Stover walked outside and looked down at the corpse of his Platoon Leader. “Contact!” he yelled. “Everyone inside! Shut the doors!”

  Rivers looked at Cole. “What is it? Hunter?”

  Cole looked wide eyed. “No. Too fast.”

  “Can’t you do your… mind thing?”

  “It’s not…” Cole struggled for the words. “It has no mind. Shoot the damn thing.”

  A thud echoed from the roof, the click of talons against sheet metal.

  Rivers pointed his rifle up. “Ceiling!” They unleashed a barrage of bullets skyward.

  The creature leapt, landing stealthily alongside the house. It darted to the front porch, sliced deep through the door. It moved to the corner, slicing through the siding, clean into the frame and into the interior. It moved to the next corner, then the next, then the next.

  “It’s toying with us,” Rivers whispered. “And what is that smell?” He tasted the air, the sickly-sweet aroma.