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Solo

Page 14

by Mike Kilroy


  “I can’t either.”

  “I can see just fine,” Tom said, pointing to their left. A dog, foam spilling from its jowls, stood about thirty yards away. “Told you they weren’t going to let you go.”

  Solo slowly and quietly pulled his knife from the sheath.

  Mar gripped the same knife she had used to dice up Vegetable Guy.

  “Where are the other two?” Mar asked.

  Solo looked to Tom.

  Tom shook his head and smiled. “Don’t look at me. I’m not a fucking dog GPS.”

  Solo stared at the dog, a black boxer—angry, hungry and rabid—that was inching closer.

  Solo patted Mar on her forearm. “I’ll take care of him. Keep Uno safe.”

  He crept forward, his boots cracking over branches. The dog did not take kindly to this and growled, showing its teeth.

  Solo stalked closer and the dog charged. It jumped on Solo and knocked him to his back, the boxer snapping his jaws inches from Solo’s face.

  Solo strained to keep the dog’s bite from his flesh and finally was able to thrust his knife into the boxer’s neck.

  The dog whimpered and flopped into the tall, brown grass. Solo stood and peered down at the poor animal mournfully. The boxer was still alive and in pain.

  Solo took his knife and slid it quickly into the dog’s heart. He heard the last tortured breath of the animal escape.

  “Solo!” Mar yelled. He swung his head around to see the other two dogs flanking her and Uno.

  Solo crouched and made his way slowly toward them. “Just keep still. Very still.”

  The two dogs were bigger and sicker than the one Solo had just put down. Before Solo could reach them, the dogs attacked. Mar was able to stick her knife into the German Shepherd while the other, a large mix, made a lunge at Uno, who fought it off the best she could.

  Solo sprinted toward the fighting dogs, grabbed the mutt by the nape and stuck the knife in its chest.

  Uno lay in the grass, breathing heavily, blood seeping from bites on her withers and loin.

  Mar crawled to Uno and pulled her close. “It’s okay, girl. You’ll be okay.”

  The dog whined and squirmed in Mar’s arms as she rocked her.

  “Tell her,” Tom said. “Tell her that dog is all but dead. It needs to be taken care of. Now.”

  Solo knew Tom was right. Even if Uno could survive the bite wounds, she would die anyway from the rabies infection.

  “Mar, Uno isn’t going to make it. We need to put her out of her misery.”

  “No, no, no,” Mar repeated, hugging Uno tightly.

  “It needs to be done,” Solo said, his voice cracking. “It’s the humane thing to do.”

  “Maybe she’ll be all right. Maybe she won’t get rabies. Maybe we can find something to treat it? There has to be a vet office nearby. We can go get her medicine.”

  “It’s already too late. She won’t survive.”

  Uno whimpered and cried loudly and Mar began to sob uncontrollably. She kissed the pup on her head and whispered, “Goodbye,” as she handed her off to Solo.

  “I don’t want to know how you are going to do it,” Mar said. “Just make sure she doesn’t hurt.”

  Mar pushed her way through the brush toward the road and disappeared. Solo peered down at Uno and began to sob.

  “Jesus. Do you have to cry about everything?” Tom was not very sensitive to the situation. Solo, though, expected nothing less from his dark side.

  Solo placed Uno on a tree stump. The dog’s chest heaved with labored breaths. He took the knife and stared at the bloody blade, then at Uno.

  This was a terrible way to put a dog down, but it was the only way at his disposal. He had no gun. He had no bullet to make it quick and clean. All he had was a knife and he hoped he could push it into her heart quickly enough to cause her as little pain as possible.

  Solo held Uno and closed his eyes. “Sorry, girl,” he said as he plunged the knife into her chest. The dog cried, quivered and then stopped moving.

  His instinct was to bury her, but that wasn’t feasible. Instead, he left her there, on that tree stump, knowing she would be devoured by other animals.

  Such was life in the After.

  Cruel.

  ***

  Mar said little on the rest of the journey. She was mourning.

  So was Solo, but he mourned much more than for Uno. He mourned for the one percent who had to live in this world and he mourned for the one-hundred percent who lived in the other.

  He came to realize that no place was safe for him or anyone else.

  Things were a different kind of terrible here.

  He came to grips with the fact that there was probably no escape from the pain.

  They entered the city, the buildings crumbling, and came to the place where they had both been in the Before.

  It was mostly as he remembered, save for the brown grasses that had begun to engulf the steps leading to the broken glass doors and the crumbling façade.

  Mar stood next to him and peered up at the building rising high into the azure, cloudless sky with a look that Solo could only describe as disdain.

  “Are you remembering now?” Solo asked.

  Mar shook her head. “No. But I know places like this.”

  They climbed the steps, slipped through the frame and walked the hallways that smelled musty. Mold crawled down the walls from cracks in the ceiling and up the walls from cracks in the foundation. Chairs and tables were turned over and papers littered the corridors.

  They snaked their way through the filth and into the ward where Solo was in the Before. He saw the Ping Pong table where he played against Gingivitis Guy, the table where he played cards with Eye Lyds, and the chairs, still set up in a circle, where they had group.

  “Well,” Mar said, taking a deep breath. “What do we do now?”

  Solo looked around, his eyes finally setting on Tom, who pretended to play Ping Pong. “Find that wacky doctor’s office.”

  Solo didn’t say a word as he began to walk down the hall toward Dr. Hu’s office. The floors were no longer polished to a shine and the lights that were bright above had long since gone out.

  Mar followed hesitantly behind him, examining her surroundings. Solo could tell she was trying to remember, with no success.

  Dr. Hu’s office door was closed, his nameplate still fastened and straight. Solo turned the handle, but the door was locked. He threw a shoulder into the door, but it didn’t budge.

  Solo looked to Mar. “Help me here.”

  Mar stared at the door and traced the nameplate with her fingers. “Dr. Hu. Dr. Hu. I remember him. Short Asian dude. Creepy smile. Had the habit of saying your name after every fucking sentence. Squeezed shoulders.”

  Solo nodded and smiled. “Yup, that’s him. Help me get this door open.”

  Together, they threw their weight into the door and it buckled. They repeated with more force with no luck. On the third attempt, they finally busted the door open.

  They heard a scream. “Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!”

  It came from under Dr. Hu’s desk. Solo quickly reached into his bag and pulled from it the knife. Dried blood was still caked on the blade.

  “Who’s there!” Solo bellowed.

  “Solo, um, Morris?”

  The crown of a head popped up from behind the desk, and then a complete face, worn and tired, eyes droopy and bloodshot, face covered with a fuzz of brown hair. Even beneath all that, Solo could tell who it was.

  Brown Robe Guy.

  “Solo!” BRG exclaimed again. “I’ve been waiting for you. You finally made it.”

  BRG raced around the desk and threw his arms around Solo. He was still wearing that brown robe and it reeked.

  Badly.

  BRG pulled himself away and smiled at Mar. “Peggy. Nice to see you again, too.”

  Mar looked at Solo, bewildered and confused.

  “How long have you been here?” Solo asked.

  “Since Babylon. We
’re all here.”

  “Who’s here?”

  “Everyone now. Well, almost everyone.”

  BRG patted Solo on the shoulder and slipped through the open door. It took Solo and Mar a few shared dumbfounded looks before they followed him.

  BRG stood in the middle of the common area, near the Ping Pong table, and cleared his throat. “It’s okay, everyone. They’re here.”

  Slowly and one by one, they began to spill into the room. First it was Normal Looking Guy, then Suicide Girl and then Gingivitis Guy.

  They stood in a circle near the chairs, in the same places in which they sat for group in the Before, and stared at each other with blank expressions.

  Some things never change.

  “Where’s that guy in the catatonic state? The creepy vegetable?” Normal Looking Guy asked.

  Mar and Solo shared another look. “Well,” Mar said. “He’s no longer a vegetable.”

  By the look on Normal Looking Guy’s face, a strange narrowing of the eyes and folding of the lips, he had no idea what that meant.

  It was probably better that way.

  “Why us? Why all of us?” Suicide Girl asked. “Why are we all in this hell together? Everyone else is gone but us. And now we’re all back here. What the hell is going on?”

  It couldn’t be a coincidence—Solo had long stopped believing in coincidences. There was indeed a reason why they had all been reunited here, in this place.

  I just have no idea what it is.

  “Does anyone remember when we were here before?” Solo asked. He received some nods and some shakes of the head.

  “We all have missing pieces of our memories,” Normal Looking Guy said. “We all are a little confused.” BRG jumped and pumped his fists, drawing a frown from Normal Looking Guy as he continued. “Some more than others.”

  “Who wants to play Ping Pong?” Gingivitis Guy asked.

  Solo and Mar shared another look, one of deep concern. Mar remembered little. Solo remembered more, but was still at a loss to explain this.

  Mar was right. More questions here than answers.

  It seemed BRG’s memories were the most intact and he had been here the longest.

  Perhaps he had answers.

  BRG scanned the faces and smiled widely.

  “The freaks shall inherit the Earth!” BRG bellowed, thrusting his fisted hand above his head and shaking it. “We are the kings of the world! We are the kings of the world!”

  Solo sighed.

  Freaks indeed.

  Chapter Nine

  The Babylon Five

  The sound of Brown Robe Guy’s almost-delirious gibbering echoed throughout the ward, which was now like a tomb.

  It was hollow and lifeless, an eerie reminder of the Before.

  It wasn’t a very good place to be then. It was a far worse place to be now.

  Some things never change.

  BRG blathered on further—nonsensical words jammed together in slurred sentences.

  “What’s he saying?” Mar asked as she knelt and grabbed one of the many wrinkled and grimy papers that were strewn on the floor.

  Solo could only make out a few words of BRG’s rants, words like “delusion” and “damned” and “unrighteousness.” BRG seemed quite happy, though. He skipped about, picking up papers with his right hand and stacking them carefully in his left.

  Solo did the same, but without the crazy talk.

  “I don’t know what he’s saying. He was like that in the Before, too,” Solo said, plucking another piece of paper off the floor. “He likes the sound of his own voice. He’s harmless.”

  Mar snatched the last sheet and handed it to Solo. “Maybe I should ball this up and shove it in his mouth.”

  “Ha!” Tom crowed. “Maybe the devil bitch ain’t so bad after all.”

  Solo and Mar made their way back to the common area. Stacked on the Ping Pong table were pyramids of papers and folders and charts—everything they had scrounged together from the ward and its offices.

  Dr. Hu’s office, strangely enough, had no files in the cabinets or desk drawers—not so much as a post-it-note—which was curious to Solo.

  And also vexing.

  “So, what do we hope to find in this heap again?” Normal Looking Guy asked, adjusting the glasses on the bridge of his nose, only they weren’t really glasses, just the frames. The lenses were poked out.

  Solo guessed he wore them because it made him feel smart or normal or the combination of the two. He, though, looked like he had come through the last two years quite comfortably. His clothes, a crisp white dress shirt and khaki pants, were wrinkle-free and his shoes, brown suede loafers, were clean.

  He had eaten well: he had a flap of gut hanging over his belt.

  “Clues,” Solo answered. “Anything to explain why we’re here.”

  “You’re not going to find nothing,” Suicide Girl said. She sat in a chair in the corner, brooding, and puffing on a cigarette.

  Some things never change.

  She wore a long coat over black yoga pants. She was pale and her hair was long and tangled. She looked rather healthy, though.

  Mar walked slowly toward Suicide Girl, who peered up at her through wide eyes.

  Suicide Girl pointed at the approaching Mar with the cigarette pinched between her index and middle fingers. “Your eyes. I remember those eyes.”

  “Yeah,” Mar said. “And I remember kicking your ass.”

  Suicide Girl flicked her cigarette at Mar and stood, ready to fight.

  “Enough!” Solo bellowed. Mar swung her head around to peer at him, obviously shocked that he had spoken so forcefully. It was the new Solo; the Solo who wanted answers; the Solo who wanted some semblance of reason. “We’re in this together. We have to work together.”

  BRG skipped into the room, grinning.

  He was happy. God knows why. He looked as if he had been through hell: clothes tattered, face gaunt, eyes sunken. He was thinner than in the Before, but apparently much more content in the After.

  It was hard to imagine anyone being content in the After.

  Normal Looking Guy grabbed a sheet of paper off a stack and began to read. He took his faux glasses off and smiled. “That’s better. Let’s see.” His eyes ran over the lines. “Uh huh.” He traced his finger down from top to bottom. “Uh huh. Very interesting.”

  “What’s it say?” Solo asked, craning his neck to try to get a better look at what NLG was reading.

  “If you buy one medium pizza from Dominoes you get another medium pizza for free.”

  “Oh!” BRG bellowed. “I’d KILL for some pizza.”

  Solo snatched the paper out of Normal Looking Guy’s hand and shook his head.

  Tom laughed. “Fucking geniuses. You’re surrounded by fucking geniuses. You think they’re gonna help you? They’re all cuckoo. Were Before and especially now. They’re lost causes.”

  Solo hated to agree with Tom, but he did. They were troubled in the Before and were even more troubled now in the After.

  But they were all he had.

  Some things never change.

  Gingivitis Guy sobbed in the corner. He no longer had gingivitis, though. He no longer had any teeth. As he cried, his lips stretched to reveal a toothless mouth and pink gums. No one consoled him. They just ignored him and left him to his despair.

  Solo wanted to comfort the poor, toothless guy, but didn’t know what to say. He could tell him everything was going to be okay, but he didn’t know that. In fact, he felt the other alternative more likely, that things would never be okay, that things were never okay to begin with. That was hardly an inspirational thing to say to someone who was already overcome with melancholy.

  Solo stuck to the task at hand. “Everyone. We need to go through these papers, find something—anything—that can shed some light on what happened to us.”

  Solo split up the stacks for each of them to pore through. Even Gingivitis Guy decided to help, albeit reluctantly.

  Suicide G
irl grabbed her stack and sighed. “This is useless.”

  “There’s a reason why we are all here. It’s no coincidence,” Solo said. “We’ve all been pulled back here. Our paths have intersected for a reason. Let’s get to work to find out why.”

  The others nodded, some enthusiastically, some hesitantly, but they all got to work. Solo took a moment to study all five of them: Mar, Suicide Girl, Gingivitis Guy, Normal Looking Guy and BRG. Under the pain and the anguish and the deep flaws were people, just like him, looking for answers and peace.

  He was going to lead them to it, if it was the last thing he did.

  ***

  Solo watched as the blood oozed out of the paper cut.

  It stung.

  Solo didn't mind. It was the first thing he felt that he was sure of since he had been back here, in this place.

  It was refreshing to know he could still feel.

  They leafed through the mounds of papers. Solo's eyes were beginning to burn and his temples were beginning to throb with the strain. All they had found so far were innocuous memos and notes and jottings that shed little light on why they were here in the Before or why they had all returned here in the After.

  Mar's frustration bubbled over. She slammed her hands on the Ping Pong table and growled. “There's nothing here. This is bullshit.”

  The others continued to fumble through their stacks, eyes passing over lines and lines of type and hand-written notes.

  “I'm not finding nothing, either,” Suicide Girl said, sighing. “I'm tired and hungry. And this sucks ass.”

  Gingivitis Guy kept plugging away, tracing the lines with his finger and mouthing the words as he read through his flapping lips that folded over his toothless gums. He caught a glimpse of Solo staring at him, did a double-take and shrugged.

  BRG said nothing. He did nothing—he had quit hours ago. Instead he sat in a molded plastic chair near the thick window that was still intact with his legs tucked against his chest and his chin resting on his knobby knees. He wistfully gazed out the window as he spoke. “I don't know why you guys are looking for answers. There are none—at least none you want.” He turned his gaze toward the group. “You won't find any answers in those papers. You already have the answers and you have forgotten them.

 

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