The Lost Gods
Horace Brickley
Copyright © 2014 by Horace Brickley.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, write to the publisher, addressed “Attention: Permissions Coordinator,” at the address below.
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Publisher’s Note: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are a product of the author’s imagination. Locales and public names are sometimes used for atmospheric purposes. Any resemblance to actual people, living or dead, or to businesses, companies, events, institutions, or locales is completely coincidental.
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The Lost Gods/ Horace Brickley. -- 1st ed.
Special Thanks to:
AJ Sikes, author of Gods of Chicago, for his advice, proofreading, and tireless support.
Lindsay, and No Story PR, for spreading this further than I ever could have.
Riahna “Remy” Malay, for the book cover and promo art.
Lilith the 5th and Michael Schutz, for additional promo art.
Jackson, for getting Jesse and Adam out of the forest.
My parents, brother, and friends for all their love and support.
Robert Berge, author of Perduo, for beta reading the book.
The other beta readers: Maria, Lindsay, Aaron, and Pete.
Sal and Jason, for getting me into zombies.
Iris and Jason, for making a foreign land accessible.
And a very big thanks to you, for taking a chance and purchasing this book. Now, take my hand and follow me on this adventure.
“If [you do not] open the gate to let me enter,
I will break the door, I will wrench the lock,
I will smash the door-posts, I will force the doors.
I will bring up the dead to eat the living.
And the dead will outnumber the living....”
― Descent of the Goddess Ishtar into the Lower World” Jastrow Morris, 1915.
Prologue
Back When Things Fell Apart
A combination of the dank, piney aroma of weed and the foul stench of half-smoked cigarettes floating in the swill of spent beers mixed in Jesse’s nostrils as he entered Adam’s living room. Adam gestured to his brown couch, polka dotted with stains and burn marks, with a sinewy hand. Jesse pointed to the tattoos on Adam’s fingers that read: PUNK ROCK.
“Those are new,” Jesse said.
“Man, you’ve been gone a long time. I’ve had these for a few years now,” said Adam. He splayed out his fingers so that Jesse could see the prison-style artwork.
“Speaking of which,” Adam said and he walked over to a worn turntable that was missing its cover. Adam pulled an LP out of its sleeve and set it down like a mother laying a baby in a crib. A wild drum beat and a lightning fast guitar riff charged out of the speakers. What sounded like a goblin began screeching words that Jesse could not understand. The only line he could make out was slow death.
“What is this?” asked Jesse.
“Are you serious? This is the Accüsed. Fuckin’, the baddest band out there, man. Straight up gutter shit. I love it,” said Adam. By the time he sat down next to Jesse the song was over and another frenetic track followed. Adam switched on the TV.
“Shit, where are my manners? Can I get you something?” he asked.
“What do you have?” asked Jesse.
“I’ve got a couple deuce-deuces of craft brew.”
“Sure, that sounds great.”
Adam got up and went into his kitchen. Jesse could hear him brush a pile of debris aside to open the refrigerator door. On the TV screen was a show about alligator hunters in the Everglades.
“I can’t believe they put this stuff on a channel that’s supposed to be about history,” said Jesse.
“What’s that?” Adam shouted from the kitchen.
“Nothing, just talking to myself.”
Jesse flipped through the channels. Paternity test reveals, redneck entertainment, storage unit auctions, and pawn shows comprised the bulk of each network's offerings. Adam came into the room and set down two large bottles of beer.
“Cheers, motherfucker,” said Adam as he raised his bottle.
“Prost!” said Jesse.
“What language is that? Russian or some shit?” asked Adam.
“Nah, it’s German,” said Jesse and he clinked Adam’s bottle with the top of his. “No glasses?”
“None that you’d want to drink out of. Unless you want hepatitis.”
“So how long have you been living here? Are you the only one living here?”
“Not long, man. About a year. I’ve been working down at Puget for a while now. I make decent bank. But fuck all that talk, that shit’s boring. What’s your plan now that you’re out of college?”
“Well, I’m kind of at a crossroad. I could start training for the Olympics, but they’ve been talking about getting rid of wrestling. And, the Olympics are two years away down in Brazil. I don’t know what I’m supposed to do in the meantime. It’s not like I can get a job with a history degree.”
“What did you minor in?”
“Art history.”
“Oh man, you’re fucked. Do you want me to get you a job down at the shipyard?”
“Might as well, right?”
“Well, shit you look like you could do the Olympics right now. You were always in good shape, but shit man you look like a Greek god or something. I ain’t hitting on you though. Just sayin’.”
Jesse raised his bottle and clicked his tongue.
“Did you win a championship or anything?”
“Yep, Division One for 197 pounds. Undefeated.”
“No shit?”
“None whatsoever.”
“My man.”
Jesse was about to change the subject when the channel switched to a woman dressed in a sharp suit. She sat alone, at a large gray desk, with an apocalyptic backdrop on a screen behind her. The news ticker at the bottom of the screen read: Multiple Countries Invaded By Unknown Army.
“Hey Adam, turn off the music. I think something important is happening.”
…
She glared at the camera. Her lips cut a thin, red line across her the chiseled features of her face. Her expression was a rehearsed combination of somber and confident. She had reported on Darfur, Somalia, Myanmar, and tragedies of human and natural origin. During her first few years on the job, those dark images kept her up at night. Visions of starving people with sunken faces, unnaturally wide and white eyes, jutting ribs, and distended stomachs came to her throughout the day and night. The aftermath of IEDs, drone strikes, riots, and civil wars left an imprint that she could not shake, at least not without a bottle of wine. Her coverage of the massacres at the border between Mexico and the United States had inspired a codeine habit. Bloodshed, famine, earthquakes, typhoons, and military escalation were truths she had to confront every day and report to the world, with the help of discreet beige and white pills. She had fancied herself a courier of important messages to the world, and while the job had burdened her with memories she could not escape, it also gave her a sense of worth and importance. When she sat in front of that camera, sw
eating through her thick makeup in high definition, she felt like the harbinger of the apocalypse. It was over, but everyone had a right to know what she had known for weeks.
“You're on in five, four,” said the camera operator and he mouthed the remaining numbers. He had sweat through his shirt and his underwear. Moments before, his glistening hands had fumbled with the focus dials. The newsroom was kept at a brisk 65 degrees Fahrenheit.
“This is Casey Hartwell for CFC World News,” she began with the same strong voice that gave news of the end of the Iraq war.
“Towns and cities in the Middle East and North Africa have been overrun virtually overnight by what has been described as the walking dead. Skeptics contend that these walking dead are nothing more than armed rebels. Some call them rioters or anarchists. Video and photographic evidence, as well as eyewitness testimony, reveal something else. Something much more sinister. Live from Istanbul, we bring you Mehmet Yilmaz. Mehmet, what can you tell us?”
Only silence and darkness transmitted for moments that stretched out into consecutive eternities. Casey wondered how many people chose one of those blank periods to pull the trigger, kick the chair holding them up, or slide a half-dull knife down their forearm. Her face remained stern and hopeful, as her mind sank into darkness. The screen flipped from black to the pixelated outline of a man in an opulent mosque.
“Mehmet are you there?” Casey asked. She leaned forward, pretending that she was in the mosque with Mehmet.
“Mehmet?”
Darkness resumed. In her head, she heard the snapping of rope, the muffled blast of a pistol in a mouth, and the cry of pain from the not-quite-sharp-enough knife.
“It seems like his feed has been severed,” she said. After another pause, the feed returned. Mehmet was close to the screen. His face was visible, as was his fear, but the background had gone to black. The soft glow of the device he used was the only light in the feed.
“Casey, are you still there?” said Mehmet. His accent was slight, but his voice was frantic.
“Mehmet, what can you tell us?”
“It's true what they say. I can tell you that, but it's far worse than you could ever imagine. There are so many of them. It's absolutely astonishing.”
In the background, there were shouts and wails in Turkish. Casey waited for the noise to die down before she continued.
“Could you estimate how many there are? And by them you mean the walking dead?”
“Yes, these are the walking dead, Casey, or whatever you want to call them. We don't have long here, I'm afraid.”
“What do you mean, Mehmet?” Casey said with genuine concern, “Are you injured?”
“No, I'm f...,” said Mehmet and he paused for a moment, “I'm not injured. The team is actually holding out in the Blue Mosque along with several hundred others. It's just that there are so many of them outside. I went up on one of the minarets earlier. Every street is filled with these things. The smell was horrid, even all the way up there. Down here, it's positively nauseating. There are just so damned many of them.”
“I'll ask again — how many do you think?” Even in moments of peril, Casey's training forced her to dramatize already dire situations.
“Pick the highest number you could imagine, and then multiply it by a hundred, or a thousand. A countless number of these creatures have filled the city. We are completely overrun, Casey,” said Mehmet.
“I'm so sorry,” Casey said. Her vision went double for a moment as she stared into the main camera again.
“Don't be, Casey,” said Mehmet. He took a breath and continued, “We've come to terms with our fate. One of the Imams is about to begin the adhan. It's almost sunset, so we are going to pray and then — then we are going to open the door to the mosque. We've been here for days, and there is no possibility of escape. There was a broadcast this morning by the military. Their effort to push back the creatures has failed, and they told everyone to evacuate Istanbul since Ankara and the mainland have already been overrun. The message was too late though, by the time the word got out these things were already pouring into the city by the millions. It's a hopeless situation.”
“Mehmet, don't give up. I'm sure they can send a helicopter to airlift the survivors,” she said although Casey knew he was right. She knew it was over. All week reports were coming in about sudden invasion in dozens of countries along with orders to keep the information under wraps. She stopped listening to Mehmet for a moment and focused on how many pills remained in the small, tan bottle she kept on her nightstand. Ten, maybe twenty, not enough. Not unless, she drank heavily as well.
“It's too late for that. There's nowhere for the helicopter to land and there are far too many people in the mosque to evacuate.”
Mehmet winced and turned to say something to someone off screen. When he turned back around, he did not look into the camera.
“Mehmet, can you describe the events that happened before you all took refuge in the mosque?”
A barrage of noises came from the feed and Mehmet shouted to someone off camera.
“No, Casey there is no time for that. You will all know soon enough what happens when they come. These are the end times. Let me just say this, Casey: God is good. Allah is merciful and we will meet him in paradise. I'm going to turn off the feed. Prepare for their coming, and make your peace with God. They've already made it to Cyprus and Greece, if that tells you anything. Goodbye.”
The sounds of the adhan filled the speakers as Mehmet's crew cut the feed. At that moment, Casey could not remember if the construction crew had finished remodeling her bathtub. She did not want to die in that tiny plastic tub.
“Mehmet? Mehmet,” Casey said and she held her finger to her earpiece for dramatic effect. Casey would not sign off for the final time without a grand departure. She had covered nations falling and rising before, so why not the human race? Casey began composing a final message to humanity worthy of the Edward R. Murrow in her head. A voice came into her ear monitor. A talking head was ready to calm the world: to give hope.
“We appear to have lost Mehmet, in every sense of the word, as well as Istanbul. Wait — one moment, I'm getting an urgent message. Great. OK. Good, that's good. OK, I've been assured that there is no threat here in San Diego or on this continent. There have been no reports of these creatures here, nor have there been any in nearby countries. The UN and NATO ban on air and sea travel is still in effect, but in all other regards everything is operating as normal. This is sad news from Istanbul, but we have a feed coming in from Secretary of Defense Talbot. He has a report on the current situation. Mr. Secretary?”
“Yes,” said Leon Talbot. He was a retired Army general with dark brown eyes and a jaw that looked like it had been donated to him by a horse. He sat in an oak chair, his posture straighter than the back of the chair. He was middle-aged and slender, but the way he carried himself said that there was one more fight left in him.
“What can you tell us about the situation in Turkey?” Casey asked. She never did get around to buying that cute pink pistol that her fiancée suggested she purchase after that incident with the stalker fan.
“Turkey,” he started in a low monotone voice, “is what we call a full loss region. It has been completely overrun, but, and this is an important point, we have created a strong perimeter in Greece and Bulgaria, and we have the bulk of our auxiliary forces ready for deployment in Germany. These things will not make it out of Turkey, and I assure you that NATO has the full support of most of the remaining UN member nations.”
“Mr. Secretary, we now have reports about these — enemy combatants storming in and overrunning towns, cities, and possibly entire countries, as we've seen in Turkey. What can you tell us about the world situation?”
Talbot remained silent for a moment. He looked down at a beige dossier. He squinted his dark eyes, clenched his jaw again, drew in a breath and then he relaxed his jaw just enough to speak.
“I don't want to cause too much alarm, but the sit
uation is not good. We need all the support we can get, and the president has issued austerity measures. We all need to use as little as possible, since the war effort needs food, metal, and all the fuel and resources we can get to combat this new enemy.”
A line of text came across the screen with the local addresses and website for donations.
“So, you are confirming that America is now in a new war?”
“Yes. This can be seen as an extension to the global war on terror.”
“So, these are enemies are to be considered as terrorists.”
“The distinction is unimportant. What is important is that citizens abide by these austerity measures that allow us to operate effectively.”
“Certainly, sir. We all understand the need for austerity in times of turmoil, but what specifically is happening in those regions.”
“Some information is classified, but I can tell you that the Middle East, which we define as the Mesopotamian region, is the source of this new enemy.”
“Are you telling us that these enemies, as you are calling them, are Middle Eastern?”
“No, that's not what I'm saying. What I'm saying is that the earliest reports of violence and this massive mob of violent hominids came from the area around Baghdad.”
“You used the term hominid. Are you implying that these are not humans?”
“There is no definitive evidence at this point as to who or what this enemy is, and evidence is especially difficult to come by due to the violent nature of this enemy. They respond to no known language, nor to any incentives. Only a few have been successfully captured, and they are — unique, to say the least. They exhibit no fear or fatigue. They can take heavy punishment and keep coming. Small arms fire is nearly useless on the larger groups. Explosives have little to no effect either. That means that they are extremely hard to combat in large numbers, and they appear to have an endless supply of fresh bodies to substitute for their fallen comrades. Not to mention this war is fought primarily in urban areas that were caught unprepared. Most of these governments did not have time to evacuate their people, so every building and every street might have civilians in them. Combating these things is difficult when there are no civilians around, but it is nearly impossible when hundreds and thousands of civilians are running for their lives. So far, the only advantage we have in this war is that these enemies have trouble negotiating difficult terrain and obstructions.”
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