5 Years After

by Richard Correll

  The papers teased and caressed the new masters of the city, slow moving once human carcasses that seemed in a trance. A dreamlike state in a world of their own, they moved up and down the street in an unhurried rhythm. Time, after all, was on their side. They no longer felt pain, kept appointments or communicated with the world, the dead ones that still walked and lived in an eternity of hunger. Dylan had actually seen them stand completely still for a week or more. Then, the eyes would move, the nose would catch a scent and it would turn and begin to move. Their sense of smell was uncanny, like flesh-eating bloodhounds. After the evacuation, there were others on this street just like him. He watched them slowly hunt one down after another, following their scent with relentless obsession. Being joined by others who equally hungered and cornered their prey, it was always the same. The fleeting moment of carelessness that turns on you without mercy. That’s when the screaming would start.

  As more and more showed up, they held you down and began to harvest you like a pig in a slaughterhouse. Dylan remembered one guy who tried to hold them off standing on top of a Humvee outside his window. The swarm became larger as the time went on. There he was standing on top of the roof of the vehicle, swinging an axe like he was some kind of action hero. Action hero was real surprised when enough of them showed up to turn the Humvee on its side and sent

  him falling into the waiting arms of the swarm. Dylan didn’t know how but the screaming went on for what must have been an hour.

  Dylan didn’t ever try to intervene in their fate. They were the victims of their own destiny. If they lost, it was their shit to deal with and not his. He remembered one older man who was pulled down while Dylan watched from the roof. His face had looked up and their eyes had met. The man made an unspoken plea for help, for salvation and maybe envy of Dylan’s position. He wondered why he felt no remorse or guilt at watching just another death. It was coldness in him where the warmth of pity would be in others. I am a lone wolf, he would lie to himself. That’s who I am.

  He walked into the kitchen. In the darkness he felt around for the flashlight and grasped its tubular handle. The button came in contact with his thumb and the room came into view in the narrow beam of light. He felt the familiar sensation of hunger creep through his stomach as he walked over to the kitchen window. A heavy board had been nailed into place where the glass used to be. It contained a quarter-sized hole in the center for him look out in the alleyway. Dylan opened a drawer and found what he was looking for, a small dentist’s mirror. The type they used to put in your mouth for a look around.

  He inserted the mirror in the hole and began to check out his surroundings. The mirror gave him a safe view of the alley below. He didn’t think the things knew how to climb but he was not in the business of taking chances. The mirror played around the walls, doing a full 360 before he was satisfied. He thought he saw something dart past the alleyway entrance on the street so he waited a full ten minutes before opening the window. He did a slow and careful look one way and then the other before crawling out to the ladder that led to the roof.

  It was a brisk climb up two stories until he reached the top of the building. All the while he felt the growling and burning need for sustenance. It was a summer day with the smell of an oncoming downpour in the wind. He looked over the edge and urinated onto the street below. An act of defiance he now performed without thinking. Quickly washing up in one of the many rain barrels he checked on his garden: one tomato had grown plump enough but still was a shade of light lime. Fuck it, I’m hungry, he justified and almost swallowed it in two bites. The traps proved a disappointment. No rabbits, squirrels, skunks, raccoons or pigeons. He had eaten them all. Regardless of taste, it didn’t matter. Meat is meat. It all went down the same way.

  He watched the newspapers in the street pirouette with the wind as he pondered the lack of a fresh meal. He already knew why the cages were empty. He had seen it happening a little at a time. Like the warning signs of cancer in a body. A whisper of danger upon another whisper until it had grown into a voice you couldn’t ignore. He had competition. Without their original food source, necessity had created new prey.

  The things in the street had just passed their first test of Darwinism: they were adaptable. Dylan had watched them eat a family of raccoons that had unwisely decided to stand and fight over a garbage heap. He had seen them chase after pigeons in parks. His most surreal moment was coming across a massive anthill that had sprung up through cracks in the sidewalk. The black ants were a moving carpet that stretched out thirty feet in all directions. Sitting amongst this living swarm were dead things carefully grabbing individual ants and popping them in their mouths. They paid no attention to the swarms crawling all over them, attacking the large invader so near their nest or harvesting it as a source of food. It didn’t matter. It seemed like a strange symbiotic existence had been born between the two. Dylan remembered seeing at least one of the things lying on the ground unmoving. The ants had found the ears, nose and eyes to be a perfect pathway to its brain and eventual shutdown. The cannibal finding himself consumed.

  The plan today was conserve strength and wait for the rain. It was far easier to move when a downpour hit. The rain made it hard for the things to pick up your scent. Even afterwards in the humid air they seemed slow to pick up on you. He carefully worked his way down the rungs on the ladder and returned to the apartment to check on his batteries.

  They used to refer to New York as the city that never sleeps. Sometimes, in quiet moments Dylan would thumb through magazines and see pictures that were distant memories. Streets filled with pedestrians, life and cars jammed together on roadways, bumper to bumper. Buildings lit up like they were on fire. Filling the night with so much illumination it seemed unreal. All of this was just over five years ago. He would pass by the same buildings in his travels and marvel at the change, from living light to eternal darkness in the blink of an eye. He closed his eyes and dreamed of something, anything to kill the hunger fire.

  The rain pummeled his window onto Times Square. Thick sheets of precipitation filled the gutters and grounded the dance of the newspapers. They lay in drenched heaps like the carcasses of butterflies that had come to the end of their life cycle. The dead things stood in the rain like Easter Island statues. Unmoving sentinels awaiting their next instinct in their march through eternity. He scanned the ones on the street closely before throwing on his gear.

  He slipped on his long-sleeved black shirt and started the slow process of wrapping old magazines around his arms and wrists, holding them in place with generous amounts of duct tape. Jacket, black gloves and oversized back pack. Tonight he would be searching for batteries. Not the kind for flashlights, car batteries. They gave him light. Light was a small comfort at the end of civilization.

  Sometimes Dylan wondered about his destination in life. Preordained? That was for people who believed in that sort of thing. But when you‘re lying in bed at night and you can’t sleep, it’s a teasing thought that lingers in the shadows. You escaped jail to find yourself in a new prison. Karma can be a cruel bitch.

  Ten years ago his path to Times Square had started in New Jersey, stealing cars at the age of fourteen. In a life with very little encouragement, the speed that he could break in, hotwire and drive away was awesome. Who would have thought his career was going to be eliminated by technology. The anti-theft devices made hotwiring a thing of the past. But, hey, who really pays attention when those things go off anyway? Carjacking was the new way to get wheels. Dylan just did not like the chances you’d have to take. Still, he had to get paid. His knowledge of cars brought him to his next job: chop shop.

  A stolen car comes in. You take the parts out and sell them for more than you would get for the car. Safer too, it’s impossible to track stolen parts. Stolen car? Yeah, you can get caught. Stolen parts were an amazing payday. It was so amazing that it went on like a steady gig for four amazing years. But everyone’s luck runs out eventually.

  A beautiful Escalade
had just come in and he had just jumped in the cab to pop the hood and see the guts of the engine when his world changed. There were shouts on the floor as a couple of the guys ran past the Escalade screaming about “pigs” and a “raid.” The first uniform he saw made his eyes widen as he lay down in the cab so no one could see him. Every once in a while he would check the rear views or pop his head up to look around. Tinted windows were so cool—he knew nobody could see inside.

  Checking the rear views he gasped and almost stopped breathing forever. There, walking a line of stolen cars was a cop with a flashlight. He would shine his light inside and then try the door handles. He was only two cars behind the Escalade. Dylan popped his head up over the dash and looked out over the hood. The garage door to the shop was open, a tempting invitation to go for it. His time was up. Move or lose. That was an easy choice.

  He sat up in the car seat and started the engine. It turned over smoothly. Escalades always do. The cop behind looked up and his mouth dropped open to say something. He froze for two seconds. That was all that Dylan needed. He slipped the SUV into drive and stomped on the accelerator with the tunnel vision of the desperate. All he was looking at was that open garage door. It was his passage to salvation, his one chance. If he had not been so intent on the door he might have seen a cop with his hand held out telling him to stop. He heard a bump as the officer’s body made contact with the grill.

  Dylan had years to think about it. If only it had been a car he was in and not an SUV it would have been different. The cop would have landed on the hood. Maybe rolled off and not even gotten a scratch. He would be free, driving a few miles before ditching his wheels and then making his way on foot to…wherever. But it wasn’t. It was a big, motherfucking SUV with a massive grill that you could not get over. You had only one way to go: under the wheels.

  He heard from people all around him that the cop he had killed was a great guy. Father of one, had been married just two years. He had been a high school athlete who coached kids on the weekend. He was even a big brother to a kid that might have been him in another time or place. Setting him straight, getting him a life. What was he? He was the sack of shit who killed a good man. He was the dirt bag who was a cop killer.

  He didn’t even remember the trial. It was a blur of witnesses, questions and more questions. It hadn’t been the way he wanted it to be, he wanted to say that. He wanted to make it right. But he couldn’t. He wanted another chance. But they were fresh out. The blur ended with a gavel crashing down and him being led away. He wasn’t sad, angry or anything. He was just numb. He walked away without a word. He said nothing to anyone on the bus to the penitentiary. When he was raped behind a bunch of machines in the laundry room he didn’t say a word. The fire was out. He was done.

  Two years into his sentence they were working beside a forest near a highway. The day was sweating hot, the kind where you can’t see half the time because of the sting of sweat in your eyes. Dylan worked away with his shovel cracking the hard earth that could use a steady rain. He worked with a slow, steady pace of a machine.

  From the forest there was a shout, a cry of pain and then several voices shouting in chaos. The shovels stopped moving as the gang of workers began to watch for the commotion. There were gunshots, first one and then two more.

  ”Fuck,” a large man beside him said in a South Carolina drawl. “Somebody’s gettin’ it.”

  The gunshots came in a staccato rhythm. First a bunch, then one or two as the rest reloaded. Then again, after a minute or so, a few of the prisoners looked around. First, slowly and carefully and then they picked their moment and direction to start moving away. Some in a dead run. Others sleepwalked away as carefully as they could. Dylan didn’t remember what he did. He was just suddenly on the other side of the highway, looking for a clothesline to steal something else to wear other than prison stuff.

  While sleeping in a forest, he saw his first dead person. It just reached out from the trees and grabbed his arm. Instinctively, he pulled away and tried to run. Stumbling in the loose earth, he fell to his knees. It landed right on his shoulders, biting into the jacket he had just acquired. Dylan remembered looking at the face while they struggled on the ground. The grey cheekbones jutted out like the whole face had shrunk two sizes. The lips had somehow retreated on the face to reveal brown teeth that snapped at his hands while he held it down. The eyes seemed glazed and cloudy with straw strands of blond hair crowning an almost bald head. He wasn’t even sure if it was a man or woman. He threw two quick punches that connected perfectly but seemed to have no effect on it. His eyes found what he needed a foot away from the thing’s head, a rock the size of two fists. Holding the thing by the throat as it crawled for a handhold on him was more of a balancing act than anything. He worked the rock free from the claylike earth in the forest and brought it down hard. He saw the face change into that of the guy who had dragged him behind the laundry room machines and had raped him so bad. The rock came down harder and harder. The face started to cave in from the blows as he felt adrenaline flow sweetly through his muscles and give him more strength to finally fight back.

  He had been exhausted. Half an hour had past and he was still looking at the caved in face. He was a killer again. If they ever caught him, he wasn’t sure what would happen but this time he would plead self defense. Suddenly, on an urge he leaned forward and looked closely at the clothes it had been wearing. It was a casual dress jacket and shirt with matching pants. His hand moved into the breast pocket of the jacket. Bingo. The soft leather feel of a wallet. He pulled it out slowly. As if too much movement would awaken his victim.

  Walter Schotski was the name on the driver’s license. The face looked nothing like him. But there was no picture on the credit cards required so he had just become Walter Schotski. He counted out over four hundred dollars in twenty’s, tens and fives. Whatever had happened to make Schotski this way could be contagious. He needed to shower right away. He got up, a little unsteady at first and his head swam at the sudden blood rush.

  Finding a motel was a fifteen-minute walk after locating a road. There was a crowd of people in the diner watching the news. He glanced in at the old TV set that had so many faces turned to it. “Bulletin” was the only word he saw as he quickly shuffled off to his room and the longest hot shower he had ever had.

  He took time to brush his clothes. He even washed them in the sink. The last thing he wanted to look was out of place. If they were looking for someone, they would always s notice the one who seemed unkempt, out of place. It took hours to dry his clothes with the tiny hairdryer attached to the wall in the bathroom. He silently wondered what the person next to his unit must be thinking, hearing the hairdryer on for over forty-five minutes. The shower and careful cleaning of his clothes was worth it. He looked like a young man when he walked out of that room. Clean cut, clothes a little big but maybe that was the style where he was from. Definitely not out of place. His confidence soared.

  He knew what he needed to do next: be in a big city where he could get lost. He first thought was of finding an older car to hotwire but he quickly dismissed the idea. That was what authorities were waiting for, the criminal to do a crime. It would be a clear red flag to his location. Instead, he walked to a train station. Walter Schotski would travel on Amtrak.

  It had been two days since Schotski had been killed, more than enough time to cancel his credit cards. Dylan played it safe and paid cash. The train ride in had an indelible sense of fear to it. Not from Dylan and his real anxiety about being captured, but around him. For the first time he carefully studied the faces on the train. A lot were intently watching news programs on their phones and IPads. Emotion creased into their faces like fault-lines of fear. He was sure of it. This wasn’t about the jailbreak. Something else was going on. He dared not speak to anyone or call attention to himself in any way. He carefully placed the knowledge away and kept his eyes open for more information.

  He kept his eyes straightforward when a uniformed offi
cer walked into the car and surveyed the people with a slow, calculating sweep around the room. He walked slowly up the aisle and looked carefully at each person in the car. He would make eye contact with each and nod to them. As he moved closer to Dylan’s seat, Dylan couldn’t help but notice the submachine gun hanging at the ready in his hands.

  “Afternoon, sir.”

  Dylan suddenly realized he was being addressed and looked up with a start. “Uh…yeah, hi,” he said nervously.

  “Are you feeling all right, sir?” The question sounded loaded. The submachine gun wasn’t pointed at him. But could be if it was moved an inch or so.

  “Yes, I’m fine.” Dylan nodded. He made eye contact with the officer. It seemed to be what the man wanted, to assess him for some reason. “Sorry, I’m just a little tired.” He added, “Guns kinda make me nervous.” The machine pistol was now pointed right at him.

  “Sorry about that, sir. They are kind of a necessary evil these days.” The machine pistol turned with the officer and proceeded up the aisle. “Have a good day.”

  Dylan nodded and tried not to exhale. He kept the corner of his eye on the red exit sign at the front of the car. Its plastic surface was reflective enough for him to watch the officer as he moved to the back of the cabin. He felt something cold touch him inside. Wait a minute, his eyes narrowed. When the fuck had the cops started packing that kind of heat? He took a long, inaudible deep breath and let it slowly go. You have your own problems. Don’t worry about this…yet.

  The next three months he slept on rooftops, listening to the sound of gunfire and sirens wail through the night like a symphony for the retreat of reality. He stayed away from crowds, watched the world from rooftops as it came apart and then he started his plan to leave.

  He would line up like the rest of the people for ferries, buses and trains. He would see people being examined by EMS workers and get pulled out of line. They would protest loudly with words like “It never touched me, really!” or “It’s just a scratch.” The speed with which they were led away told Dylan he wouldn’t be seeing them again. He knew why by now. His eyes would look up the line as nonchalantly as he could and then his hopes fell down hard, kicked to the curb. There was a platoon of riot police backed up by military checking ID before letting people pass. His eyes grew as wide as the depth to which his heart sank. He dared not turn away and run out of the line. That would be deadly. He just stopped moving and let people pass him. Then slowly, he turned away and walked calmly in the other direction. If he was asked what he was doing he would say he had forgotten his wallet. Good, that would be good enough for a getaway.