The Scourge

by R. Tilden Smith

  “Wait!” Marcia said, as Melvin helped her into her seat and strapped her in. “We can't leave Oscar! He’s still out there!”

  “I’m so sorry ma’am,” Charles said, “General Hernandez and the lieutenant didn't make it. They stayed behind, held off those things long enough for the rest of us to get on board the chopper.”

  Marcia closed her eyes and bowed her head, sobbing. “Oh God no...Oscar...I’m so sorry…”

  The helicopter tipped forward and began to ascend. Charles helped Jim retract the doorway stairs and close the cabin door. Harold fell back into one of the empty seats and buckled himself in. “Did you see?” he said. He was visibly shaking. “I wouldn't have believed it if I hadn't seen it myself! Those things...those things used to be human! Somehow the virus is able to mutate the human form into a completely different species! Unbelievable!”

  Jim sat down next to Marcia as the helicopter banked sharply, giving him a clear view of the stadium complex. “Dear god,” he murmured.

  The entire stadium grounds were crawling with mutants.

  “They're everywhere,” Harold said.

  “Look!” Charles said. “They're dragging people into the Astrodome!”

  Charles was correct, they could see people being dragged or carried from the stadium, their colored clothing bright against the ink black sea of swarming mutants.

  “Madam President,” Jim said, “we have to contain this. We cannot let this invasion spread any further.”

  “Is that what we're calling it now?” Charles said. “You believe those things down there are extraterrestrials?”

  “I don't know what else to call it Charles. We know enough to know they're no longer human. You saw what happened to some of the soldiers. Once infected, those things were able to control their minds, forcing them to shoot at each other and at us! We can't let this get out of Houston. We have to stop it and we have to stop it right now.”

  “But how do you stop it?” Harold said. “The more ground troops you send the higher the risk more become infected. Those soldiers down there turned on us within minutes of being infected. Obviously, this virus is exponentially mutating, becoming more specific and specialized with each generation. We don't know what its final form will be or what it will be capable of. For all we know, sending in more troops could be helping them build their army.”

  “I agree,” Jim said, “I'm not recommending we send ground troops.” He studied the president's face. She looked distraught. Jim prepared himself. She's not going to take this well, he thought. “Madam President, I recommend we call in an airstrike of the stadium complex and the surrounding area.”

  Marcia's face fell. Harold spoke up before she could get a word out. “My god man, are you out of you mind! Blowing those things up could have the effect of aerosolizing the virus, pumping it into the upper atmosphere, and spreading it around the globe.”

  “You're right, that's why I'm suggesting we use napalm. There's no way any living organism can survive that amount of heat.”

  “You can't be sure of that,” Harold said, “it survived reentry from space.”

  “Come on Harold! Your own reports said that the virus most likely survived re-entry because it was buried deep inside the vessel and the outer shell of the craft served as a heat shield, allowing the virus to survive intact.”

  Marcia held up her hand to stop the conversation. A look of surprise and disgust crossed her face. “If we do this, we’d be killing tens of thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands of innocent lives. I cannot have that much loss of life on my conscious.”

  “Madam President,” Jim said, “if we don't do it, or do something like it, millions will die...or worse.”

  Marcia sighed, leaned back in her chair, and stared out the window. The stadium complex was rapidly receding from view but she could still see the plume of black smoke rising into the air, almost a perfect mirror of the much larger plume rising from what remained of Houston's downtown. Sixty long seconds went by before she spoke again. She sat up in her chair, straightened her suit jacket, and wiped the tears from her face. She stared at Jim, any and all emotion snuffed from her expression.

  “Do it,” she said.

  58

  “Ray,” Moji called from the living room, “can we leave now please? I want to get out of this place. It stinks.”

  “Hang in there for a few more minutes,” Ray answered, “I just need to find something.” Ray was rifling through the ammo drawers in Terp’s closet. He had Terp’s AR-15, with a full thirty round magazine, slung over his shoulder. A large army surplus duffel bag lay at his feet, half full with canned goods, water, two hundred rounds of ammo, and the first aid kit.

  “Ray, something’s happening, I can feel it. We have to leave soon or it will be too late.”

  Ray paused. Ever since Moji's personality reemerged, her speech has been peppered with premonitions. Sometimes she didn't even realize she was doing it. It was weird, but he couldn't help but take her seriously. “What’s happening babe?” he asked. “You think we gonna run into those unborn things or dogs or something?”

  “I...I don't know. What are you looking for that's so important?”

  “I’m looking for another magazine. There’s over two thousand rounds of ammo in these drawers. Terp’s gotta have another mag for this rifle somewhere around here.”

  “Just hurry up, ok? I don't feel comfortable sitting out here by myself but I can't bring myself to be in there...with her.”

  “I know babe, I’m almost done.” Ray tried not to think about it, but he’d rather be anywhere else right now than in the same space as Crystal’s quickly decomposing body. I’ve seen a lot of terrible shit while I was in the army, but what's happening to Crystal is some straight up Wes Craven level crazy shit. Her body was literally melting from the inside. Black liquid oozed out of her mouth, eye sockets, ears and, gauging by the amount of black puss that had pooled in the middle of the bed, most of it was escaping from her genitals. What was left on the bed was just a wrinkled sack of blackened skin floating in a thick pool of half melted black jello. And it smelled horrible. He stole quick glances at her corpse every so often as he searched for the magazine. I definitely don't want to be in here with that shit any longer than I have to. What worried him the most was that he was certain it was the virus that was causing Crystal's body to decompose so rapidly. And there’s a high probability me and Moji both have that shit coursing through our veins.

  He shook his head to force himself to focus on the task at hand. He was about to give up when he finally found what he was looking for, hidden under a pile of old newspapers. Jackpot! he thought. He scooped up the magazine and threw it into the duffel bag. He took one last look around the panic room. He really didn't want to leave this place. It had everything they needed: food, water, medicine, shelter, clothing, and most importantly, firearms. But Moji said they had to leave, had to, she said, and not just leave this apartment, but the whole damn building. And why do we have to do this? Because she's convinced that she has to find this queen person before the Lara personality squeezes her out and becomes the dominate one. And why am I going along with it like a good little sherpa? He hefted the duffel bag over his shoulder. I have no fucking idea.

  Moji was sitting on the couch when Ray walked into the living room. Like him, she had changed into some of the fresher clothes that Ray had scavenged from other units in the building. “Ok, I've got everything I think I need.” He sat down next to her. “Are you sure we have to go through with this? Laying low in this building until real help shows up sounds like a better plan.”

  “I'm sorry baby but we can't,” she said. There was terror in her voice. “I can feel her Ray, I can feel Lara reaching into my mind, trying to take things that don't belong to her. I know it sounds crazy but if I don't do this she will be in control forever and I’ll be...I’ll be gone.”

  Ray wasn't convinced, but he didn't push it. Moji had been through a lot in the last twelve hours. And now with the los
s of her best friend, he knew that she was teetering on the edge of madness. He didn’t want to tip the scales and lose her too. “Ok, then tell me again, real slow, what do we have to do so that you can be alright?”

  Mojo rubbed her temples. “I told you, we find the queen. She's real close. I can feel her—I mean, Lara can—it’s like we're being summoned. She’s looking for us.”

  “Back when we were in the truck, Lara said she knew where to find this queen. Do you know where that is?”

  Moji squeezed her eyes shut and forced herself to concentrate. “Yes. There's a place...a place with several big tanks of something that looks like water, but I can't be sure. The queen, she's there.”

  “Do you know what it looks like? Is it one of those mutants?” Ray squirmed in his seat at thought of having to tangle with one of those things. He fondled the shoulder strap of the assault rifle on his back. At least I know those motherfuckers aren't bulletproof.

  “No, I don't have any sense of who or what the queen is. I just know I have to be there.”

  “At the place with the water tanks?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Is there any other details about the place we can use to help us figure out where it is? You said it was close.”

  Moji closed her eyes again, took a deep breath, then gagged and spat the air out of her lungs. “Ugh! The whole place smells like...like poop.”

  “Poop?“ Ray smirked and shook his head at Moji's use of the childish word. “Wait, you never been to this place. How do you know what it smells like?”

  “Please Ray, it's not funny. I'm scared. The things I’m remembering, these are Lara's memories. When I was younger, before I learned to suppress her persona, Lara would...do things, things I had no part in, things I had no recollection of ever doing.”

  Ray reached out and took Moji's hands in his. “I'm sorry babe, I'm not trying to make fun of you. I just trying to understand, that's all.”

  Moji eyes went dark. She began to wring her hands together. “Then I need to tell you the rest of the story,” she said softly, “the part I've never told anyone about.” She rested her head on Ray’s shoulder. “Soon after the doctor weaned me off of the drugs, I started having the blackouts again. Like before, I would wake up in strange places, my whole body sore, wearing dresses that were too small. But this time, Lara wasn’t talking to me.”

  Moji was quiet for some time. Ray could feel the moisture of her tears through his shirt. He wanted to comfort her, tell her everything was going to be alright, but his gut told him that now was not the time. He let the silence linger, praying that Moji would find the courage to speak aloud to her demons.

  Eventually, she did.

  “Oh Ray,” she sobbed, “most times I would wake up in the alley behind my building, my wrists and ankles bruised, with semen in my hair and running down my legs, not wearing any underwear. I would sneak back in my house and try to wash it off, but I couldn't Ray, I couldn't! No matter how much I scrubbed and scrubbed, I still felt dirty. I couldn't bear to tell anyone what was happening to me, not my teachers, my doctor, not even my mother. I was so afraid that they wouldn't understand, that they would think it was me doing those things and everyone would see me as nothing but a whore or a slut. So I hid it away and pretended everything was fine, and that I was getting better, and that I had Lara under control. But Lara wouldn't stop! It kept going on and on, until strange men started calling our house asking to speak with Lara. My mother thought it was some sort of phone company mix up and didn't give it too much thought. She just told them they had the wrong number. But I knew who those men were looking for. I knew they were looking for me.”

  “Baby, I’m so sorry,” Ray said, his voice hoarse with grief. “I don't—”

  “Ray, I had to leave Boston, leave Massachusetts altogether. I couldn't stay and face my family and my friends. They wouldn't understand. They wouldn't believe it wasn't me who did all those horrible things. So I left. I left as soon as I was able and I never went back.”

  Ray didn't speak, he just put his arms around her and held her close.

  “I’ll understand if you don't want me anymore.”

  The words were spoken so softly that Ray wasn't sure it was Moji that said them. He brushed his hand across her forehead so that she would look up at him. “What's my name?” he asked.

  “Your name is Ray. Why would you ask me that?”

  “You don't feel an urge to call me army-man?”

  “What? Why would I call you that?”

  He pulled her to him and kissed her. “It's not important,” he whispered, “all you need to know is that I want you more than ever.”

  The relief Moji felt was almost palpable. For a precious few moments, her anxiety melted away and she forgot all about the explosion, the alien virus, and the frailty of her own mind. She kissed Ray deeply, savoring every part of him; the touch of his lips against hers, the taste of his breath in her mouth, and the musk of his unwashed body. After much too short a time, Ray broke the kiss. She pushed her palm against the base of his neck to keep him close, nuzzling her nose to his and tracing the part in his lips with her tongue. “You don't know much I've wanted someone to say that to me,” she whispered.

  Ray responded by tilting her head back and kissing her again. She closed her eyes and succumbed to his passion, welcoming it as it consumed and bled away her fear.

  Ray leaned back and smiled at her. “If it were any other time and any other place, I would be content to hang here and do this all day. But if we're going to leave, we best do it now before we lose the daylight.”

  “You're right, but we still don't know where to go.”

  “I've been thinking about what you said, about the tanks of water and the smell. I think I know the place you’re talking about.”

  “You do?”

  “Yeah. Come on, we can probably see it from here.” Ray grabbed Moji's hand and led her to the window in the second bedroom. He drew the venetian blinds out of the way, giving them a clear view of the inner courtyard pool area.

  “That’s a swimming pool,” Moji said, puzzled, “I don't think it fits the description.”

  “Shit, I forgot about this courtyard.” Ray tapped his finger on the window. “See those units on the other side of the courtyard? On the other side of those units and down the street about another two blocks, sits the North Braeswood wastewater treatment plant. I took a tour of it once. Inside the main building its got six big tanks that they use to sift the shit out of the water. Stinks to high heaven up in there.”

  “That's got to be the place.”

  “Yeah, let me grab my stuff and we'll head out.”

  They walked back to the living room. As Ray was gathering the gun and the duffel bag, they heard a faint rumbling coming from the outside, in the direction of the front of the building.

  “Sounds like a convoy,” Ray said. He went to the living room window and pulled the string to raise the venetian blind. Instead of folding upwards, the entire apparatus came crashing down, slamming onto the window sill and then falling on to the floor. Ray coughed as plume of thick dust was thrown into the air around his head.

  “I could of told you not to do that,” Moji said.

  Ray shrugged and waved the dust from in front of his face. “Look, I was right, it's a military convoy.”

  They pressed their faces against the glass, watching the train of armored personnel carriers, Humvees, and supply trucks barrel down the esplanade from the north, crossing their vantage point at a high rate of speed.

  “Those guys are in a serious hurry,” Ray said, concerned. “They're either running toward or away from something.”

  “Look!” Moji said. She was pointing at the building next to theirs as three people, a man and two women, came running out onto the sidewalk, waving their arms and yelling. “Looks like they're trying to get someone in the convoy to stop and help them.” One of the vehicles, a Humvee with an armored, glass-enclosed turret mounted on its roof, veered out of con
voy formation, then slowed as it approached the group waiting on the sidewalk.

  Ray grabbed Moji's hand. “Come on, if we hurry, maybe we can catch a ride too.” He had already turned his head away from the window when he heard the rapid ching-ching-ching-ching sound of a large caliber machine gun being fired.

  Moji jerked her hand out of his and screamed. Ray turned and looked out the window in time to see the three people on the sidewalk below being cut down like a weed-whacker slicing through dry grass. Blood sprayed from their torsos in a wide arc as the slugs tore through their midsections.

  “No!” Moji screamed again, slamming her fist against a window pane, shattering it. The sound of breaking glass attracted the attention of the Humvee’s gunner. The turret swiveled toward them, the gun’s long barrel pivoting until it was aimed directly at their window.

  “Get down!” Ray said, tackling Moji at the waist just as bullets ripped through the apartment, disintegrating the window, and turning the drywall ceiling above their heads into a snowstorm of gypsum powder. “Stay down!” he said, motioning for Moji to crawl to the apartment's front door. Heavy arms fire continued to pummel the street-side of the building. Ray could hear windows above and below their floor shattering as more firearms joined the assault. Please God, just let them hold off on launching a grenade until we get out of range. He tailed Moji, stopping to grab the duffel bag and rifle as they bear-crawled their way into hallway. He caught up with her about six feet south of the front door. She was sitting against the wall, her face streaked with bits of gypsum chalk and sweat. She looked terrified. He reached out to embrace her. “Babe, are you hurt?” he asked.

  “Don't touch me army-man!” Lara shrieked, throwing her hands up defensively. “Why are those soldiers shooting at us!”

  Shit, Ray thought. “I have no idea why they shot at us or why they killed those people, but I recognize scared shitless when I see it. Those soldiers were running scared, and if they're scared we probably should be too.”

  Lara started walking down the hall, toward the elevator lobby. “I'm not scared of them,” she said.