by Poss, Bryant
“I’ve got to think about this,” she said to the room in front of her. “I’ve got to figure something out. We at least need to give this some serious thought.”
The knock at the door turned both their heads, and Alice giggled at being startled.
“Speak of the devil,” she said as she got to her feet and walked to the door to let Cillian in.
. . .
Radio check Lo’s voice echoed in the hallway, and Cillian adjusted the volume.
“Five by five,” his own voice echoing in the concrete hallway. “Isn’t that what they say when it’s clear?”
How about just say clear and don’t be fancy her voice came back. He put the earpiece in his ear, so there’d be no external sound from now on.
“Clear then. I’m moving out. Keep it quiet unless it’s an emergency.”
I’m in your ear. You keep it quiet. I’ve done this a hellofalot more than you.
“Aye aye, captain.” Gripping Luck tight, he slid it into his front pocket then checked the beam of his flashlight before making his way to the book room to exit the building. The orange glow of the new sun was just peeking through the glass in the chained door at the end of the hall, and it gave him more than a little comfort to see that instead of the ash gray of an overcast sky. The chill of the outside air invigorated him as it rushed into his lungs, but the sight of the dead spazzo missing the back of its head deterred him somewhat. Looking at it now, not a carrion bird in sight, only worms, flies, and decay, he averted his eyes to the dawning of the blue sky beyond without giving it another thought.
The sun felt like it focused only on him, an astral spotlight. The call of a crow on the wind came as a welcome reminder that all had not perished, and he tightened the strap of the book bag across his shoulders and walked on, some Tolkien line about keeping your feet playing in his mind as he went. Stepping lively, he played the conversation with Alice over and over. Trying to avoid something—he was beginning to understand at a young age—was the best way to keep fixated on it. Why he focused on it, he couldn’t comprehend, but it was there just the same. The tip of the nose once it was noticed at the bottom of your vision. A scrap of food between teeth that couldn’t be extracted. The rhythm of a catchy song. Once riding the wave of attention, such an impossible thing to shake off. In his mind what she had said made sense, but it only made him angrier to realize it. What did she know? She was just a kid. Wait—just leave that argument alone for now.
“Think about something else,” he’d startled himself when he spoke out loud, and he found himself looking around, half embarrassed at the idea then he realized how glad he’d be if there were someone in the vicinity to cause embarrassment. “Might as well talk to myself. Probably gonna become a lot more common for people in the future.”
The cold weather was keeping the neglected roadside grass depressed enough for now, but in the spring and summer everything typically landscaped was going to be anywhere and everywhere it wanted to be. Nature untamed. What was mankind to do if not futilely trying to control nature?
“Survive,” he said again only to be answered by the crow he now saw perched on a light pole that existed for no other reason than to hold the bird. “I know you know.”
Shuffling feet played in the background of his intense concentration. Every sound, be it the wind, a bird, the fall of a branch, the scurrying of some animal, everything he paid attention to. This was his first time without Lotus, a fact that came to him more than once, and he wanted desperately to believe he didn’t need her, but he knew it was useless. Why was he doing this in the first place, after all? Lotus was his every thought before she was hurt, and now his need for her only grew deeper, which was the real reason he paid attention to everything out here.
This is no country for old men; this is no country for young men either. The clanging echo of metal hitting metal in the distance moved him into the treeline beside the road where he stood for several minutes, waiting to hear it again. A man could’ve been banging on a piece of an engine with a hammer. A poky could’ve knocked a hanging door off a wrecked truck. The wind could’ve knocked down a neglected sign. There was no way to know, and he moved himself back to the road, although staying close to the trees, determined to get help for his dearest.
To his surprise after half a mile, Cillian realized that he had not seen the first poky or spazzo on this trip, which brought to his mind so many things. Was there somewhere in particular they went during the day? Did they sleep? Did they seek shelter? Were they going to die without food? Would they eventually eat each other? All these questions he wondered, but he knew there was no way to get the answers except to live. Live and witness what would happen the next day and the next. How he wished he could get on a computer and search keywords. Lifespan of a poky, zombie metabolism, where spazzos go at night, but he knew those days were gone. Whatever research or history there was to be found now lay in the pages of what would become archaic books. Simple answers gone now. He shook his head and laughed despite himself. How grown up his train of thought had become as of late. Another clang of metal stopped him in his tracks and the sight of a poky down the road helped answer some of his questions about where they might be during the day.
How’s everything going? Lo’s voice came through his ear as if she sensed he might need her.
“Right as rain,” he whispered, watching the poky to see if it looked his way. “Actually, I’ve got a poky up ahead in the middle of the road. I’ll talk to you once I’m past it.”
Be sure it’s not a spazzo her voice had more than a trace of anxiety. Just try to sneak past him and look all around you in the woods. They’re just about the color of the earth at this point.
“Copy,” his voice remaining steady for Lo’s sake, but his teeth were becoming sore from his jaws clenching.
The woods gave him the uncomfortable feeling of being in a crowd. The sensation was supposed to be protective, but he found himself looking at every tree like something trying to kill him. A branch would move here, undergrowth grabbing the pants there. It became unnerving to a point where he thought he’d rather take his chances running past the poky on the road, but he made it past without further incident, watching through the trees as he progressed, the poky on the road aimlessly looking around, not moving, barely existing without stimulus.
When he was comfortable with his distance, he made his way out of the woods to speed his travel, watching the road, and the woods, back and forth until he gave himself a headache with the constant change of focus. It wasn’t until he made a mile, the line of stores of the business district in sight, that he heard the engine from the truck.
It was the smoke that helped him into the woods more than the sound. Creeping like an hour hand, he made his way into thick undergrowth, trying to ensure there were no pokies around, but more concerned with what played out barely a hundred yards from where he squatted. Cillian watched as the men, all dressed shabbily in military clothing worked on the large, covered truck in the middle of the road.
“At this point there’s more duct tape holding this hose together than there is rubber,” the man’s voice was gruff, the sound carried to his ear on the wind. One man was in the cab, and one walked around with a gun over his shoulder apparently keeping look out, while two leaned over the front of the truck, heads and hands working. Cillian watched from the trees, trying not to move, barely even breathing.
“Get this damn thing running,” the voice came, but who spoke was indiscernible. “Or just leave the sumbitch. I swear we can do this faster on foot.”
“You wanna carry everything back in your hands? And what are we supposed to do with those in the back?”
“Hell, just leave ‘em. We barely get to touch ‘em anyway.”
“You’re making this last way longer than it needs to. Try it again.”
The engine turned over a few times and coughed to life. All the men turned and watched it, waiting to see if it would remain sputtering or die once again. After a full m
inute, it seemed that they were confident in the repair. The scream was the only thing that could completely drown out the engine, and it did. None of them had time to react before the spazzo came out of the woods.
How it didn’t fall, Cillian couldn’t understand. What used to be a woman appeared out of the woods like a crazed wolverine, or rabid badger with its tail on fire. It wore the remnants of jeans and a tank top, but both were barely hanging on by threads, and its hair looked like what happened to a mop that was thrown out in the yard to dry. One breast exposed and gashes all over its body, the spazzo hit the front of a car full stride, but it didn’t so much as stumble, taking three more strides to hit the man holding the gun over his shoulder. He was stepping back, trying to lower the weapon to defend himself, but his scream quickly became louder than the spazzo’s. What used to be a woman tore into his face and throat with such ferocity, Cillian couldn’t imagine the wildest animal competing. The screams were mimicked in the soldier’s face by the spazzo before it finally bit into his chest, fingers digging into the abdomen, the screams gurgling to a halt. The soldier in the cab of the truck frantically rolled up the window, while the other two stumbled and fell to the ground. One got up and made his way to the passenger side of the truck, hitting the window and screaming until the one inside leaned over and unlocked the door. The other soldier, the one next to the victim of the spazzo stumbled to the ground, picking up the gun that was dropped a few feet away.
The spazzo seemed to look at him briefly then it went back to its meal. The soldier fumbled around with the gun, not able to control his own motor function enough the use it. After a full minute, he finally got the gun leveled. The truck lurched forward as the man popped the clutch, and the engine died again. The ignition quickly began turning over in response, but the hacking engine just wouldn’t come back to life. The spazzo looked up again just as the gun jerked back. The sound reached Cillian’s ear a quarter of a second later. What used to be a woman spun, but the bullet had obviously missed the killzone because it got to its feet, gaping hole in its arm, and made for the armed soldier. The second scream brought ice to Cillian’s veins, but he did the right thing, whether by instinct or shock, and froze where he was, not even breathing.
The scream came from not fifty feet behind him, and he heard the footsteps like death come calling. A second spazzo ran through the woods, and Cillian squeezed his eyes shut, not knowing what to do, not able to do anything else. He waited for the impact. The leaves loud as if trying to get out the way themselves. Ten feet behind. It was so fast. Cillian thought his teeth would crack from his gritting them, but he immediately loosened up when he heard footsteps go by him, a scream accompanying them. The smell was almost enough to knock Cillian down, and he found himself thinking, despite nearly dying a second ago, that if it were the middle of summer the smell would probably be unbearable from the whole world rotting. He opened his eyes to the back of the spazzo, what used to be a man this time, one pants leg gone along with most of its calf on that leg, a dark flap of skin hanging down from underneath the cloth, like a piece of wet jerky. It made its way out of the woods within seconds, taking branches and undergrowth with it, but it wasn’t until it got to the street that the shock really hit.
Everything happened through a surreal perspective for him with only the center clear and the rest of the world a blur, this scene that transpired so quickly and chaotically in front of him. It was as if he watched the new world unfold in a series of fish eating other fish, one predator bigger and more ferocious than the next. The immunes were first his most ominous threat, those who would capture him and torture him, perhaps kill him. But in the blink of an eye, the spazzo had singularly dismantled them with rage without any premeditation. And still there was more, as for the first time Cillian was able to understand why it was they never saw more than one spazzo at a time.
The female spazzo turned to the scream, and Cillian couldn’t help but watch what unfolded. They all watched. Abandoning the meal, the female met the male at the edge of the road, although meet was hardly the word. What used to be a man outweighed the female by more than fifty pounds, and when they collided it looked like a rhino hitting a deer. The female came clean off the ground in the male’s grasp seven steps until it tripped over the body of the first guard. When they hit the ground, they knotted like two pythons trying to devour each other. Although the female seemed to exceed the male in ferocity, the sheer size difference was overwhelming. Pinned on its back, the female tore at the male’s face, blood and flesh flying, but it was no use. Pain seemed to have little to no effect, and the male was able to get both hands around the female’s neck, twisting it back and forth, whatever restraint reserved in the normal human brain obviously absent, with the fingers ripping through the soft flesh of the neck until the head separated from the body, nerves arteries clung desperately to both parts, but the flailing ceased, and the male screamed a deafening shriek into the face of its foe, holding it up like a trophy before hurling the head at the coughing truck, the thump of the bone on the hood bringing everyone back to their senses. Cillian looked on with open mouth, unable to move until he saw the figure jump from the rear of the truck and make for the woods behind it. It looked to be a man hunched over and straining. The sight brought him out of his trance, and he made his way in the direction of the figure, the last thing he witnessed of the spectacle at the road was the remaining soldier training the gun on the remaining spazzo. Two shots echoed through the trees and another scream. What happened after that, he couldn’t tell. All he could think about was reaching the figure whose hands seemed to be bound in front of him. The briars grabbed at his every step, and he only paid half as much attention to his surroundings, but what he’d just seen at the road played over and over in his mind, not allowing him to focus on pain. Stopping at the edge of the treeline, Cillian took enough time to look up and down the higher road before crossing into the adjacent woods. The sound of the truck’s diesel engine could be heard once again turning over in the distance.
“Lo,” he hissed into the radio, securing his earpiece with the index finger of his free hand. A minute went by, and he sank down next to a tree to catch his breath, the only sound the wind cupping his ears, the creaking of limbs straining with it. “Lo!” he hissed louder than he’d meant to.
What’s going on Alice’s voice in his ear. Cillian, what’s wrong?
“Where’s Lo?”
She took some more pain pills for her shoulder. It’s really bad, the pain. Where are you?
“I’m in the woods—just collecting myself for a minute. You wouldn’t believe what I just saw.”
Have you gotten to the pharmacy yet?
“No, that’s what I’m telling you. I was sidetracked. You wouldn’t believe—”
But you’re okay? Alice interrupted, anxiety in her voice.
“Yeah, don’t worry—”
It’s not that, Cillian. I mean, I am worried, but you need to hurry. Lo is running entirely on the pain medicine. When it started wearing off, she went downhill fast.
“Oh man,” he got up and checked his surroundings. “If I cut through the woods, I should be able to come out behind the pharmacy if I can guesstimate the location.”
Be careful, Cillian, especially in the woods.
“I will. I’ve got to go so I can listen out.”
Every tree looked like a poky, and every sound became the scream of a spazzo. The scene with the soldiers had set a whole new level of reality—of anxiety. This world went from dangerous to nearly unlivable through that experience, but Cillian made himself move as fast as possible, thinking about what Alice had told him about Lo and ignoring the idea of finding the figure from the truck. It took twenty minutes and dodging two pokies before he came out of the woods on the drive thru side of the pharmacy. The window above the dispensing drawer was shattered, giving him an uneasy feeling about what might be inside, but he made his way across the lot, checking only briefly with eyes and ears to find out how quickly he could
proceed.
Using his back pack to cover the glass shards, he crawled through the window, every sound magnified by the microphone of complete silence. Despite the sun, the building was considerably dark, and he flicked on the blue beam of the flashlight into his hand, slowly uncovering it to light his way once nothing came at him. As the room illumined Cillian got his first glimpse at what a looted building looked like. Up to this point, luck had preserved the path for Lotus and him, but here was what most of the world looked like, no doubt. Here was the sight of desperation.
Magazines, paperbacks, comics, and greeting cards littered the floor at every step. Melted ice cream everywhere made his sneakers popped when he stepped from molded stickiness, the once sugary deliciousness now nothing more than filth to walk through. Shelves were overturned. Goods that were seen as useless to the new world lay everywhere. Overpriced toys, candy, beach chairs, portable DVD players, makeup, adult diapers, things so exposed off their shelves, things never paid attention to until now, and Cillian saw it all. Money was scattered everywhere. Currency once lived for that may now be used in a pinch to keep a fire going. That’s about as useful as its existence got in this world. As he looked around at the spectacle, Cillian suddenly became anxious, realizing what the looters would have come here for in the first place.
Stepping through the swinging gate and onto the raised platform behind the counter, Cillian witnessed what he was most afraid of. This building may have been filled with junk made in factories from every Southeast Asian country there was, and there were once people who browsed through those things, but like a service developed around communion, this church was built for one flesh and one blood, and right now Cillian could only see a few scattered remnants of the pharmacological god that was once held higher than all else on this platform. He shone the light frantically from one side to the next looking at the empty shelves of the pharmacy. Only a few pills lay on the floor in various places. He couldn’t guess what they were, but given how thoroughly this area had been cleaned out, he guessed they didn’t amount to much. Leaning back against the wall and sliding down, his heart with him, he looked at the blue beam of the light in front of him as he realized there was nothing here to help his friend, his dearest. She would lie in that makeshift home, that high school woodshop class heated with clay pots, furnished with jumpsuits and office furniture, and laden with boxes of Rice Krispies. She’d lie there and freeze in the heat of a fever, run out of pain medicine, and die a slow, agonizing death. While infected people wouldn’t eat her in this godforsaken world, bacteria would. Perhaps humans’ oldest friend and enemy there was. He’d have to get back and watch her wither away like a furnace burning out in a cold room. He didn’t want to think of it. This failure would haunt him the rest of his days, which could be today for all he knew. Life wasn’t fair to begin with, but now—now it just sucked sunup and down.
