Last Stand For Man

by Ryan, Nicholas

  A murmur of sound rippled around the room. Captain Devaux shifted uncomfortably in his chair and his eyes became nervous.

  Tremaine nodded. “Very well,” he said, and took a deep breath.

  He was about to launch into the prepared content of the seminar he used to address assembled world leaders when Camille Pelletier cleared her throat and held up her arm to show her wristwatch. “Forgive me, Professor Tremaine,” she interrupted. “But it is 2pm. “The President is giving a speech about the contagion. Perhaps we should watch that first?”

  The man Tremaine had been introduced to, whose name he could not remember, sprang from his chair and disappeared through the closed door. He came back into the board room wheeling a monitor on a steel frame. On the television flickered footage of a news anchorman speaking in French. Everyone drew their chairs around the television just as the image cut to an empty podium in front of the French flag. The President appeared from the left of screen holding a thin sheaf of papers in his hand. He stood wearing a severe black suit and grey tie. A scrolling tickertape across the bottom of the screen flashed the message:

  ‘Live broadcast by the President of the French Republic from the Élysée Place’.

  The President positioned himself behind the podium and stared directly into the television camera. Tremaine stood behind the seated men gathered around the board room table with the young woman close beside him. She looked sideways at him and their eyes met. Her gaze was enigmatic and her perfume smelled of sandalwood and lavender… subtle enough so that through its scent he could still sense the palpable fear of the gathered men. Their worry seeped from the pores of their skin, and clung thick to their clothes like cigarette smoke. Tremaine crinkled his nose.

  “He is going to announce the immediate closure of all French national borders,” Tremaine said from the back of the room. “He’ll declare a national state of emergency – which will be only the second time that has happened since the 1960’s. All border crossings will be protected by heavily armed troops. No one will be allowed into, or out of France.”

  Henri Pelletier glanced, irritated and dismissive, over his shoulder, but Colonel LeCat’s head turned, more considered. He appraised Tremaine thoughtfully, looking him up and down the way he might inspect a soldier on the parade ground. He turned back to the television just as the French President began his address.

  His voice grave and his face solemn, the French President started speaking in English. Tremaine raised an eyebrow in surprise. Clearly the address was being broadcast to an international audience.

  “Effective immediately, I have ordered the closure of all borders into France and declared a state of emergency,” the President said without glancing at his notes. “Furthermore, all flights into Paris are being grounded indefinitely and all train services into the capital are being cancelled. On the advice of my Minister for Health, only outbound flights and trains from the capital will be permitted to proceed.”

  The President paused at the podium and took a long deep breath. “We take these measures in response to the Raptor virus that is sweeping the world. Citizens in populated areas are advised to disperse. Evacuate the cities, return to your ancestral homes. The contagion spreads quickly in densely populated areas. Your best hope to survive the spread of this terrible plague is to be in low population or rural areas. Leave the cities.”

  There was another pause while the President shuffled the papers before him, even though he did not refer to them as he spoke. To Tremaine it showed a measure of the man’s nervousness. He narrowed his eyes and watched the President’s face closely. Under the bright studio lighting a sheen of perspiration showed across his brow.

  “Armed soldiers will be on the streets of Paris and every other major city within the hour. Armed troops will be blocking every crossing point into the country. Anyone attempting to enter France by any means will be dealt with in the same manner as a suspected terrorist – they will be shot.”

  That last word rang out like the doom-laden tolling of a bell. The President looked unapologetic. “This is only the second time since the Algerian crisis in 1962 that a state of emergency has been declared,” the President went on. At this stage, it will remain in effect until the infection is contained.”

  He cleared his throat, scooped up the pages into his hands, and had begun to exit the room when a chorus of journalist’s voices called out from somewhere beyond the view of the camera. The loudest voice was that of an American journalist, the accent instantly recognizable.

  “What can you tell us about the virus, Mr. President? Are there any developments?”

  The French President stopped in mid-stride and came back to the podium. He took a moment to settle himself and the silence was crushing.

  “This is a plague upon mankind,” The President said hollowly. “Already we have estimates of almost seventy million dead around the world, mainly across America at this stage, but the death toll is rising in every country affected. So far the Raptor virus has been found in twenty-three countries, including confirmed cases in the United Kingdom. There seems no cure. Those bitten or otherwise infected die a gruesome painful death, and then are re-animated within just one or two minutes. They can only be killed with a shot to the head – and they seem mindless and impervious to pain of any kind. Fire does not stop them. Nothing stops them.”

  “Are there any reported cases in France at the moment?”

  “No,” the President shook his head emphatically. And then went on. “And that is why we must take the draconian measures I have just announced – to preserve France and its people against infection for as long as possible.”

  “Is there a cure?” this time the accent was less obvious. Tremaine guessed the journalist as British, or maybe South African.

  “No,” the French President said again, shaking his head as he answered. “There is no known antivirus, nothing at all that can protect anyone from the spread of this infection. The advice from my Minister and those experts in the field of disease ecology has been that the only hope remaining is to thin out major population areas in the hope that this infection will extinguish itself. It has been barely four days. We don’t yet know how long the contagion remains virulent within those infected.” The President shrugged his shoulders. “Perhaps in a week the undead will simply expire. Perhaps the contagion has a short infection life and those who have been re-animated will simply become dead once more. We just don’t know…”

  “And if they don’t? If the infection remains virulent for a month or maybe a year… what happens then?”

  The President stared at the journalist who has asked the question for long silent seconds, staring slightly off-center of the camera while he formed an answer to the question. Finally he sighed. “Then, it is the end of the world,” he said softly. “No one will be left alive. Mankind as a species will entirely cease to exist.”

  There was a blinding strobe of camera flashlights and the President’s gaunt face became lit brightly in a long flare of white light. The assembled journalists turned into a clamoring rabble. The President seemed unaffected – almost detached. He turned away and walked slowly off camera. For a moment the shot stayed on the empty podium with the French flag in the background, and then cut back to the news anchor in the studio. The reporter seated behind the desk seemed visibly shaken.

  Slowly the men around the table in Avignon sat back in their chairs as though awakened from the nightmare of a hypnotist’s trance. They turned their eyes towards Tremaine. Henri Pelletier’s face had turned as pale as wax.

  * * *

  The television stayed on in the mayor’s office through the afternoon, the sound turned down so that it became background noise to the panicked debate that roiled around the table.

  “We must be sure!” Jacques Lejeune said. He had a desiccated voice, dry as parchment, and the manner of someone who had spent his entire dour life in a musty office. His fingers scampered across the tabletop and he snatched at a glass of water. He took a lon
g gulp, then loosened the noose of his tie. His face was shiny with his sweat, his eyes shifting nervously.

  “How much more certain do you need to be?” there was a harsh frustrated edge to Tremaine’s voice. He was no longer able to stay still. He began to pace restlessly about the room; it suddenly felt too small for him, cramped and suffocating. He went to one of the windows and twitched aside the heavy curtains. The afternoon had turned to dusk. They had been in the mayor’s office for over four hours, discussing the President’s announcement, and the implications of barricading the ancient city of Avignon against an undead swarm… and still the mayor and his deputy were vacillating.

  Tremaine turned back to face the room and the men seated around the table. His hands became fists, the knuckles whitening with frustration and tension, yet his face remained a neutral mask. “Eighty-five percent of the world’s population lives in cities,” he said. “And the population is so vast now that we’ve overcrowded the planet. Seventy percent of all pandemic diseases are passed from animals to man, so by encroaching into the areas once left to nature we have seen a huge rise in new viruses – something like three hundred in the last sixty years or so.” He shook his head. “I’m not saying this Raptor virus originated through animal infection – it probably didn’t – but the fact remains that the virus now sweeping the world was inevitable. It had to happen eventually. Previously governments have been able to limit the spread of contagions. The Chinese did it with SARS back in 2002. Once the virus found its way into the travel network it spread like wildfire around the world, ultimately infecting over eight thousand in a matter of weeks and killing ten percent of those people. The Chinese finally controlled the epidemic by quarantining everyone infected and limiting all unnecessary travel. But the contagion almost crippled the Chinese economy in the process. It cost billions of dollars through stifled international travel, and impacted business across a dozen different sectors. Compared to the Raptor virus, SARS was nothing. How could we hope to quarantine the infected of this new contagion? We couldn’t. And how can we quarantine half the world’s population? Where would we put them? How would we arrange the quarantine without the huge danger of further infection? Jesus!” Tremaine’s temper finally reached its simmering boiling point. Every second wasted in this room was another moment the population of Avignon was put at risk. “This thing is out of control. It’s not a question of ‘if’, it’s a simple question of ‘when’. And I’m telling you,” he thrust an angry threatening finger at Henri Pelletier and Jacques Lejeune, “that it’s just a matter of hours… maybe a day or two. Then death is going to be at your doorstep and you’ll either be prepared, or infected.”

  Henri Pelletier stared querulously at Tremaine, his face darkening with color. He drew himself to his feet and tinkered with the knot of his tie for a moment. “Monsieur Tremaine,” he said indignantly. “The government has closed the borders right across the country. The President himself said there is no sign of the infection yet within France. Therefore, perhaps your threats are unfounded at this stage, yes?” he spoke deliberately to provoke and saw Tremaine’s eyebrows narrow into dark pointed lines.

  “No,” Tremaine snarled. “The President said the state of emergency would only protect France ‘for as long as possible’. He didn’t say it was a complete measure that would ensure safety. Because he knows the infection must come. Nothing can stop it. It’s inevitable.”

  “And how would he know such a thing?”

  “Because I told your President’s Minister for Health exactly that. It’s how I knew what the President was going to announce. Everyone is operating in a vacuum of panic, terror and dread. But if you separate the emotion you can see the reality, and this is the reality!” Tremaine slammed his fist against the board room table. The sound was like the crack of a whip. “You are wasting time,” he glared around the room. “Twelve thousand – maybe fifteen thousand people can be saved. Avignon has the unique opportunity to provide the last stand of mankind. Please,” the tone of his voice became anguished and imploring, “Please don’t waste this one remaining chance to save lives.”

  Tremaine could see in Henri Pelletier’s eyes that he still had not made his case – the mayor remained clinging to the hope that somehow the contagion that had swept through over twenty countries would miraculously sidestep France. The mayor glanced over his shoulder and made eye contact with his Deputy, Jacques Lejeune. A silent message passed between the men. The mayor turned back to Tremaine and the tension in his features softened and became sympathetic for a moment.

  “You are tired, Professor,” he said with silky condescension. He took Tremaine’s arm and began slowly guiding him towards the doors of the boardroom. “Your trip has been exhausting and this meeting has gone for too long.” When they reached the doors, Pelletier stopped and stared Tremaine in the eyes. “My colleagues would like some time tonight to consider your views in privacy. We have heard your arguments. Now you must give us the time we require to reach our decision about what action should be taken. In the meantime, we have a hotel room reserved for you within the walls of the old city, and my daughter here,” he gestured to the young woman, “will take you on a tour of the old fortifications and then to a local restaurant for dinner.”

  “No,” Tremaine shook his head, his eyes furious. He shrugged off the mayor’s grip on his arm. Somewhere in the back of his mind he had the startling realization that the pretty young woman was the mayor’s daughter, but at that very moment he was too aggravated, too incensed, to recognize the fact. “This cannot wait for you to waste more time talking. You must decide now.”

  Pelletier shook his head. “No, Professor. That is what you want, of course, but that is not what we are obliged to do. We will instead, continue with our private discussions and re-convene here at 7am tomorrow morning.”

  “It will be too late!” Tremaine snarled.

  Pelletier looked stoic. “I hardly think so, Mr. Tremaine. We are many hundreds of miles away from Paris and the coast of England. Even if the infection is as virulent as you say, it cannot reach Avignon before tomorrow morning. There will still be time to act… if indeed a course of action is the decision we arrive at.”

  * * *

  Tremaine followed the young woman down the staircase and out through the front doors of the Town Hall. At the rear of the imposing building they climbed into a Peugeot hatchback. The young woman hitched her skirt above her knees and threw the car into gear.

  “My name is Camille,” she said brusquely. Her eyes were slanted and narrowed.

  “You’re the mayor’s daughter,” Tremaine nodded wryly. “I didn’t realize.”

  “Does it make a difference to you?” her tone became defensive. She had been watching his face, but the instant Tremaine turned to answer, she lifted her chin in a gesture of disdain.

  “Nope,” Tremaine sighed. He tried to sit back in the passenger seat, his legs cramped under the dashboard of the compact little car. Camille Pelletier reversed, spun the wheel hard and slipped the car into first gear, her movements smooth and precise. She stomped her foot on the accelerator and wound down her driver’s side window at the same time, flicking a glance into the rear view mirror as a kind of apologetic afterthought to anyone else who might be using the road.

  She drove with her brow furrowed, her soft pink lips pursed. Tremaine watched her from the corner of his eye. Clearly, she was unhappy with the task of escorting him on a tour of the old city. Well it went both ways, he decided. He didn’t want to be run around town. He wanted to start drawing up plans for the fortification of the walls. He let out a long weary sigh and folded his arms across his chest.

  “Why were you at the meeting?” Tremaine asked.

  Camille flicked him a glance as she turned left, and then took a sharp right onto a narrow cobblestoned road that ran parallel to the open air plaza. “To represent the business community,” she said.

  “Why you?” Tremaine persisted.

  “Because I am the night manager of
a local hotel,” Camille said, narrowing her eyes and then lifting her chin arrogantly. Her mouth was a hard line and her eyes darkened and gleamed dangerously. “I wasn’t at the meeting because I am the mayor’s daughter, if that is what you are implying, Professor Tremaine,” the stiffness came into her voice. “I have studied hospitality for six years, and the hotel I run is the most successful in Avignon.”

  Tremaine tried to look apologetic, but didn’t try too hard. “Well good for you,” he said dryly. She was pretty he decided, but typically French – there was something grating and prickly about her attitude. “How do you feel about what I presented to your father and the others in that meeting? Do you believe me… or are you your father’s daughter?”

  “I am both,” Camille’s eyes glittered like the sharp point of a knife. “I am a believer in what you said, and I am my father’s daughter. You are American, Professor Tremaine. You do not understand Avignon, or her people. We are a small place in the south of France. This is not Manhattan or Los Angeles. We are different people. We approach things differently.”

  “I understand that,” Tremaine said with frayed patience, “but if your father doesn’t pull his thumb out of his ass, he is going to be responsible for the unnecessary deaths of up to fifteen thousand people.” Despite the almost pleasant tone of his voice, there was real tension and strain in his words. “So if you can do anything… anything at all. If you can say something that will make your father act – please, do it.”

  Camille arched her eyebrows and huffed. “So you think I am at the meeting merely because I am the mayor’s daughter, and for that reason you are cynical of me. Now, you would wish me to influence the mayor on your behalf because I am his daughter,” she slowed at a pedestrian crossing and stared coldly at Tremaine. Her knuckles were white on the steering wheel and there was an angry splash of color on her cheeks. “In France we would call you a hypocrite,” Camille said bluntly. “Is it the same word in America?”