The Hollow Men (Book 1): Crave

by Jonathan Teague

  Tom heard Santa’s panicked breaths getting closer and, wanting to lure the other attacker, shot his arm out and pulled the terrified man around the corner into the bright sunlight.

  When Tom loosened his arm around his neck, Santa seemed surprised to be staring into the eyes of the Korean driver who had warned him to get away.

  With a stern glare, Tom tapped his finger against his lips in a command to be silent. They both listened for the other attacker.

  After a moment, Tom again grabbed the bloodied body of the Neanderthal and dragged him just into view. He stared directly into the shadowy street and barked in an unmistakable Aussie accent, “You’re deep in the cactus, mate. I’ll give you one chance to show yourself before I pull you out and rip you to pieces.” Then, to emphasize his point, he delivered a vicious kick to the inert body at his feet.

  A man with a sweat-beaded, bluish-skinned face emerged from behind a parked van. His snaggletoothed mouth and bulging eyes stood out against his pallid skin. He moved in a skittering, hesitant way as he stepped into the street. He extended a tremulous arm, pointing a large kitchen knife at Tom, and taunted in a hoarse, whispery voice, “I’ve stabbed this into more people than you can count. This is going to be very painful.”

  It did hurt. When the man lunged with his knife, Tom glided out of the way, caught the attacker’s wrist and yanked it across in front of the man’s body. Driving his palm into the back of the now-extended elbow, he broke the radius and ulna.

  The man stared dumbly at his crooked arm while his brain processed what had happened. Shock didn’t stifle the agony of shattered bone and a dislocated elbow. He gave a miserable screech that trailed off into a whimper. He opened his mouth to say something, but before he could utter the first syllable, Tom’s fist blurred through the air, smashing through soft lip-tissue and fracturing teeth.

  Spitting out blood and three of his front teeth, the would-be attacker staggered back into the alleyway and shouted a parting threat. “You are going to pay. I promise you.”

  Tom’s expression was blank, as though he had done nothing more than cross the street, in spite of the abrasions across his calloused knuckles and the broken teeth lying on the ground.

  Santa leaned against the wall, knees wobbling in aftershock. Tom put his hand on Santa’s shoulder to steady him. After Santa nodded, Tom returned to the Neanderthal lying in the street and pressed two fingers to his carotid artery. “He’s a goner.”

  His knees cracked when he stood up. Though he felt no need to justify his actions, he wanted the man in the Santa costume to understand how dangerous the situation was, hoping it might do some good in the future. “I didn’t mean to kill this bugger, but I’m not sorry. He was a killer and I learned the hard way you need to put a dangerous man down quickly, with as much violence as necessary.”

  Santa pointed to the shadowed corner in the alleyway. “There’s a woman down there. I think she’s probably dead.”

  Tom strode toward the woman lying in the cluster of stinking garbage bags. He didn’t need to check for a pulse. If her heart had been beating, the punctures in her chest would still be bleeding. “She’s long gone, I’m afraid.”

  He scooped up the red bucket lying near the girl and turned back to Santa. “You need to bail. I can’t stick around and it’s not safe here. There were three of them, and the third is either still waiting or gone to get more people. Let’s get you to your car. Where is it?”

  Santa kept staring at the dead man on the ground, stunned. Tom sympathized; it was rare for a civilian to witness a violent killing. However, he felt no regret over the death of a man who had tortured and killed a woman. He snapped his fingers and said with more command, “Hey, get past it. Let’s go! Where’s your car?”

  They hurried the remaining distance to the car. Santa had been prodded crisply and often by his rescuer-turned-drill sergeant. When they reached his car, he overcame his shock enough to stammer a fervent thanks.

  Tom handed the red bucket to Santa. His tan face relaxed from the stone-cold expression of a soldier into a beaming smile. “Merry Christmas!” he said, slid a $100 bill from his wallet, folded it, and deposited it in the donation bucket. He clapped Santa on the shoulder—”Sorry, mate. Gotta run”—and sprinted away, vanishing around a corner.

  CHAPTER 3

  LOLLING HEAD

  Santa sat shaking in his car. It had only been fifteen minutes since he’d first entered the alley. He struggled to wrap his mind around what he’d just experienced. He’d never seen anyone die before, and now he had seen two deaths, and almost witnessed an actual killing. Images of the lifeless woman flashed through his mind.

  He added the $100 bill to the pitifully few coins inside the donation bucket. He believed he’d been a force behind the turnaround in Riverton and a conduit for the people of the town to help families in sore need But what good was the money he’d collected over the years if he couldn’t save a girl from being attacked and killed so boldly in the middle of the day, only a few blocks away from him?

  Because of his bell ringing, his raspy singing or being lost in his thoughts, he hadn’t heard the slightest thing. She was dead and he lived. He’d failed her. The sour taste in his mouth from vomiting in the alley grew worse. His skin grew clammy and a shudder from his stomach pushed what little it had left into his throat. He tilted halfway out of the car to retch a concoction of saliva and stomach bile onto the ground. He wiped at a foul trail of drool, unintentionally rubbing it into his beard.

  Despite the big Korean’s warning, he needed to see the alley one more time, to hammer into his brain that this had actually happened, that violence was part of the new reality of living in a time and place where neither nature nor humanity could be counted on.

  He drove to the entrance of the alley, stopping short of running over the man that his rescuer had killed. The man’s legs were twitching, jerking his feet wildly on the pavement, as though he was thrashing in pain but at super-speed. What if he’d been faking? Could he have fooled the big Korean? And if he could have, maybe the woman was still alive as well! Shaking off the temptation to drive away, making it someone else’s concern, he grabbed his phone and dashed to the side of the injured man.

  Before he could get close enough to check on him, all of the Neanderthal’s limbs jerked uncontrollably. His abdomen contracted, curling his body into a tight ball. Then his back arched, splaying his arms wide. His meaty hands clutched at air.

  Santa backed away and dialed 911. “There is an injured man here at the corner of Main Street and the alley between Fourth and Fifth Avenue. Please hurry.”

  “What is your callback number?”

  “It’s my cell phone. The area code is…”

  Movement in his peripheral vision made him look up. The woman by the garbage bags had propped her naked body against the grimy brick wall. Her arms were trembling, and her head shook back and forth as though she were trying to remember what had happened.

  Shocked to see her alive, he choked on his saliva. He coughed out to the emergency operator, “She’s alive. She’s hurt. Hurry,” hung up, and rushed to the poor woman, kneeling as he put his arm around her bare shoulders. “It’s OK, dear girl. I’m here to help.”

  She turned her ashen-grey face to his. Her eyes were flat and unfocused; her lips quivered as if trying to say something. He leaned in to hear what she wanted. With impossible strength, she gripped his head and pulled him closer.

  CHAPTER 4

  SHADOWS FALLING

  That fall, the temperature topped 109 degrees Fahrenheit, enough for asphalt to soften. Indentations and gouge marks blotched thousands of miles of roads across New York.

  Data poured in and scientists posited a theory to explain the aberrant weather. The Chandler wobble of the planet’s axis had significantly increased and created more variation in its latitude. The change was too drastic for global warming to be the cause. Pseudoscientists and conspiracy theorists claimed governments and big corporations were using se
cret mining technology to plunder precious minerals deep in the Earth’s crust.

  Religious groups said the apocalypse was imminent, claiming the four horsemen caused the planet’s wobble as they galloped across the earth. Churches filled to overflowing, whole congregations of people queuing in the street waiting for a chance to confess their sins and be counted as a believer for the Rapture.

  Infrastructure failed in the areas with the most extreme shifts in weather. Fluctuations in power led to food spoiling. Sewer and waste treatment became erratic. Hosts of previously unknown diseases appeared—whether the result of the unsanitary conditions in those broken cities, or millennia-old bugs awakened from hibernation by climate shifts, or some other reason, it was impossible to tell. The number and spread of illnesses appeared so quickly that the immediate priority was containment. Identification and treatment would follow.

  To slow the spread of newly emerging diseases, governments put populations on hyper surveillance, quarantining areas of infection and distributing antiviral medications. In those neighborhoods where infection appeared, people fled to the homes of any relative or friend who lived in areas far removed from illnesses.

  Many sought escape through alcohol, filling the sidewalks with lurching, glassy-eyed drunks becoming so intoxicated they passed out on the street. Some people consumed damaging amounts of anti-depressants and antipsychotics, resulting in an epidemic of serotonin syndrome, a form of medication poisoning that caused involuntary twitches, abnormal postures, over-responsive reflexes, and sweating. Victims struggled to walk despite muscle spasms, suffering from delirium and collapsing in the street.

  Those less affected by the freakish weather stifled their own anxieties so thoroughly that it became difficult to empathize with the parts of the world suffering the most. They convinced themselves the media exaggerated the problems and sent money to provide relief and to quiet their consciences. Having done that, they put the troubles of others behind them and pushed themselves to live their lives.

  They dealt with the changes they could not control by throwing themselves into the most absorbing activities they could find. Recreational drug use increased, as did prostitution and gambling. Others became obsessed with video gaming, binge-watching TV—anything to distract themselves.

  To slow the spread of multiple pandemics, the Center for Disease Control pressed hard for prevention measures, hosting frequent press conferences, encouraging every day precautions, pushing for school closures and the elimination of large public gatherings.

  People reacted strongly against the CDC’s warnings. Children and the elderly received flu vaccinations, but parents decided that would protect their children enough. Schools refused to close. Big events like musical concerts and sporting competitions grew more popular than ever as people gambled with their lives, playing what they considered to be extreme odds against catching a fatal illness among the many diseases bouncing their way around the globe.

  CHAPTER 5

  HUMAN ILLS

  Warriors vs. Eagles. Neither team was the home team. New York state high school championships were hosted at the Carrier Dome in Syracuse. Neither team had played there before.

  Taking the advice of the CDC, the New York state government required that the high school semi-final games be played behind closed doors, shutting down attendance to protect the public from itself. The confrontation with government officials almost turned ugly. Just in time, local television sports anchors intervened, soothing angry parents and fans by promising not just NFL-worthy broadcasts of the games but special feature pieces highlighting each one of the High School Senior players to help them woo the scouts of college football teams.

  In quarantining the semi-final games, the government won a short term victory but lost the bigger fight. People were even hungrier to see the final game in person. This time pressure was too high and a violent reaction seemed probable. Officials let the championship game go forward.

  As a result, a crowd of approximately 49,000 people were descending on the stadium—just short of the attendance record.

  Tom raced down I-81. The game would be starting in an hour, and he wasn’t going to be late. His fifteen-year-old son Chase played first-string varsity football for the Warriors. Chase was a husky kid, already six feet tall. His bourgeoning power and agility made the young running back a high school all-star with 1,989 yards rushing and 37 touchdowns in one season. He was a key reason the Warriors had made it to the state championship. Chase’s parents had been excited to watch their son play in what they anticipated would be the first of many such championships.

  A knot formed in Tom’s stomach when he glanced at the empty passenger seat, missing the company of his wife Ridley and eight-year-old daughter Katie.

  Ridley grew up in San Diego, near Camp Pendleton where Tom was stationed with the 1 Marine Expeditionary Force. She was a “surfer girl” all the way: blond hair, blue eyes, athletically thin, and tall enough in heels to reach six feet. In perfect counterbalance to Tom’s intensity, she had the relaxed nature of someone who had grown up near a sunny beach on the Pacific Ocean, warmly embracing each new day.

  Tom first saw her sitting on a park bench alone. He saw a radiance that shone from within her. She was engrossed in a Dean Koontz novel and barely acknowledged Tom when he walked over. He sat next to her and waited patiently, not speaking a word. When she looked up at him, he asked about her book and what else she enjoyed reading. Their conversation flowed as naturally as if they had known each other a lifetime. They fit together perfectly, as if fate had conspired to bring them together.

  Ridley made Tom work for it. Even though she confessed to him right away that she was interested, she told him she wasn’t a lock. He had to demonstrate patience, persistence, and commitment to making their relationship strong. On the second anniversary of meeting her in the park, Ridley finally accepted his proposal. They were married five months later.

  When Tom learned that Ridley was pregnant with a baby boy, he felt simultaneously excited and worried. He wanted Chase to be strong in body and mind without needing to undergo the kind of pain he had growing up in Australia. From the minute his son was born, he whispered to him every night the kind of man he expected Chase to become: strong, courageous, kind, confident. Tom poured all of his hopes and dreams into his son.

  Six years later, his sweet daughter Katie was born. He believed he was just hitting his stride in being the father of a boy. Now he needed to figure it out all over again. Like he did his son, he raised his daughter to be tough both physically and mentally.

  He and Ridley got her into lacrosse as soon as she was strong enough to hold her stick. Off the field, she had the sunny personality of her mother. On the field, she was the strongest on her team in both body and will, which often got her into trouble skirmishing with other players. Tom encouraged her competitiveness and was blind to her edginess. To him, she was his little angel.

  Tom’s military background made him perfectly suited to work as a security and risk-management consultant for the private security company Constellis Group. He continued to travel the world despite the multiple illnesses springing up in different countries. Since he was one of the few in his company willing to do it, Constellis was willing to pay him a premium to take on extra work.

  He never wore masks when interacting with the public, including in airports. Lately his nose and mouth were the only visible ones in a sea of faces covered in the white masks his dental hygienist wore when cleaning his teeth. He understood the psychology of people wearing them when facing a pandemic but he knew the level of filtration of these masks would never prevent a virus from passing through them.

  Personally, he never worried about succumbing to infectious diseases. He passed unscathed through epicenters of avian flu and the H1N1 virus. His immune system seemed to be super-charged. Upon returning to the U.S. and again just before returning to his house, he was fastidious in keeping his hands clean, scrubbing his arms up to his elbows in scalding water
with a fervor that would impress even someone with obsessive-compulsive disorder.

  His most recent trip to Southeast Asia carried him through Cambodia, close to where a particularly virulent sickness had suddenly appeared and was rapidly bouncing across the planet. The virus was named Thappraya after one of the main access roads to Pattaya, Thailand.

  Epidemiologists had traced the origin of the disease to a half-mile area close to the famous Walking Street, where a modest amount of money could buy sex in any imaginable form. That frequent intimate contact across multiple partners meant that the Thapp virus spread widely, and since many who visited Pattaya kept their exploits secret even before the outbreak, it was now nearly impossible to anticipate its spread to different parts of the world.

  The media reported it to be 100% lethal. Stage one began with seizures. In stage two, patients became violent.

  The city of Pattaya was quickly put under a quarantine enforced by the Royal Thai Army (RTA). The World Health Organization dispatched two agents to gather a sample of the Thappraya virus to study and develop an inoculation. While they were en route, the infection jumped to Bangkok. They landed in the Suvarnabhumi Airport, checked in with their coordinator, and hadn’t been in contact since.

  Thailand fell into chaos. The 200,000 strong RTA weren’t enough to guard Thailand’s borders. Cambodia, Laos, Malaysia and Myanmar deployed their militaries, and China and Vietnam were mobilizing to join them.

  The CDC confirmed three isolated cases of the disease had been discovered in the U.S. in the last twenty-four hours. They escalated their warnings. Most people entirely tuned them out. Thapp was lost in the noise of multiple other infectious diseases.