The Last Words

by Marcus Caine

  We got past it and went slow and quiet down the stairs. He was shooting for stealth this time. We made our way down two floors with no worries, being extra careful near the doors on each floor. The affected in there were trapped, so that wasn’t a problem, but I knew they’d start making noise if they saw or heard us, and that could bring some that weren’t trapped up the stairs. If there were any more left down on the first floor.

  But after two floors our luck ran out and one of them near the gate saw us and started chanting. Others on that floor ran at the gates, but couldn’t get through, so we started running down the stairs. The other floors had all come to their gates too, screaming and chanting in unison at the top of their lungs. If there were any loose, they would be coming now. And, of course, there were.

  Just one at first, running up the stairs, and Joe speared him like a fish, right through the head. But two more were hot on his heels and it took him the spear and his knife to down them. We ran some more when we heard more on the way. It sounded like a whole herd but these things just made a lot of noise, I guess, like they say coyotes do, and it was only five. I stepped in with sweet Susie this time and helped Joe out, then we made it all the way down to the first floor before coming across a couple more that seemed surprised to see us and we were home free.

  From the journal of Jude Guerrero

  12/25/2012

  Once we got down to the docks I motioned Tim Tom to wait while I checked outside, then went back in and gave him the thumbs up. The yard was clear, and there weren’t even any affected past the fence, though I’m sure some would wander by eventually, that’s why I had tossed down the sheets.

  There were loads of them, plenty of extras, up on our floor, so I figured I could shield what Tim Tom was doing a bit. Keep any curious crazies from trying to climb the fence, ’cause you never knew when one might succeed, or enough of them might try in the same place and bring the fence, down, which would be a disaster. The thick doors and gates and barred windows would keep them out pretty damn well, but having two rows of tall fences topped with razor wire is the only thing that would allow us to move around outside and work on these vans. It was a shame we couldn’t hole up here longer, it was damn near perfect, but we would eventually run out of food, and probably water too, and these fences and doors weren’t going to keep out any smoke or fires, which would probably be coming soon. I could see the smoke from the plant, something was smoldering over there and it was only a matter of time before it spread and more tanks blew or the wind shifted and we were all breathing toxic shit smoke. The boat would at least give us a chance. Shit, I remember there’s a boat, but I can’t remember what kind. Better go back and read the journal again soon, and do some updates.

  I hung the sheets on the fence as best I could to try to block the view in while Tim Tom started welding the grates from the windows to the vans. Then I just kept a lookout and worked I my journal until he yelled, “Hey Joe, look at me. I’m B.A. Baracus.”

  He’d finished the first van. The bars didn’t fit perfectly but he’d done a damn good job of bending them on the top and shaping them to fit over the windows.

  “I pity the fool that try to get in my van.”

  Fucking Tim Tom.

  “Shut the fuck up,” I said, knowing he couldn’t understand me, so I also held my finger to my mouth.

  “OK, OK.” He grinned and went back to work after adding, “Hannibal.”

  It didn’t take him long at all to get the next one done, and then the delivery van. But it was all I could do to keep him from yapping the whole time, alerting every chanter in the area to our presence.

  Only a couple of curious ones heard him and both came close enough to the fence that I was able to spear them in the head before they got too loud.

  I was surprised at how fast he worked, and excited. I was wondering if we were going to have to wait another day before the second phase of our plan. I looked in my journal on my notes on him as he worked and it said he’d been in construction, and he’d been injured on the job. Something went straight through his head, that’s why he was the way he is now, why he couldn’t understand what I was saying, and why the Doctor had brought him here. The Doctor had told me he was another rare case, like me and Eric.

  OK, now we had to make it back up, and I wasn’t sure if there were any more left. While the rest of the building was nice and secure, the lobby had glass doors which had been shattered, and didn’t have a fence outside it. It looks like it had depended on guards to protect it, and of course, they were all off duty now.

  We were as quiet as we could be, and with a lighter load since I had left the welding rig in one of the vans. Since it was quiet for now I decided to make the going easier for us when we brought the rest of the group down. I had Tim Tom help me move some furniture, and some heavy fucking file cabinets, into the hall that led to the lobby, the only place that didn’t have a door. It took us a while, longer than I would have liked, but now the whole way down would be secure, unless there were any more loose ones on the stairs or somewhere above us. I knew there were still plenty more in the building, but they were trapped behind locked doors and gates that they didn’t know how to get through.

  By the time we got back to our floor I had to check my journal… again.

  From the journal of Dr. Montgomery Gates

  12/25/2012

  I was a bit surprised, after only a few days, at how much I was having to fight sleep. I still had enough stimulants to keep me awake for quite some time, but I wasn’t sure I would be able to handle it. As it was I was already finding myself drifting a bit, even while standing, and once I had seen a shadow suddenly turn into a black dog before coming to my senses. I found I had to stand and walk around as much as possible, and keep my mind busy, which wasn’t difficult considering the large amount of material I had printed off the internet to go through. More and more I was confirming what I already believed; that the phrase was somehow responsible, and also that the lack of sleep was the only thing keeping Eric and myself from succumbing. It was hard to argue against that point with the affected chanting it over and over.

  Marcus had finally succumbed, leaving only Eric, Jude, Tim Tom, Cassie and myself to take care of those who were affected and the other patients who probably never would be due to their nearer catatonic state. I know, as a Doctor, I had to try and take them with me, I also know, as a human being, that I would be putting my life at risk, as well as the lives of the other survivors. But I could put mine at risk, I suppose, after all, it was only a matter of time before I slept. I knew that the forgetting drugs were a shot in the dark, after all, they only made memories duller, they didn’t erase them.

  As I watched the affected that we had locked in the rooms on our floor I hoped that I would see some sort of change. I was hoping that eventually the effects would wear off. After all, if this phrase was something that the Norse used to go into a berserker rage, or that Greek women used to go into a Dionysian ecstatic state before tearing animals apart with their bare hands, then it must wear off at some point. There was nothing in classical literature or Norse history indicated these manic states were permanent. But, I saw no changes in our resident affected.

  Perhaps the phrase was different now; translating had made it more dangerous. Maybe the effects would be different in different languages, although it was clear that it had affected other countries. Maybe there were some that were less affected. But the words are so simple, so universal, and there’s no grammar to complicate translation, just a string of nouns. It should translate so easily into any language. Surely every language, at least today, has words for moth or rye or fig or any of the other words. But did the Norse know what tigers were during the viking era? Would they have substituted some other big cat they were familiar with? They knew about lions surely. Lions were in the coat of arms of many European countries. But what if there is a language, some small primitive tribe, that didn’t have a translation for all the words of the phrase? One could only hop
e that somewhere humanity would still have a chance.

  Maybe in ancient times they had only used a part of the phrase for their effects. Or maybe there were was a counter phrase. God, I could hope, going through everything I could find about Norse mythology and ancient Greek mystery religions and the work of the linguist in Oxford. I wished and wished I could find something else, some other, shall I use the word, incantation, that might bring people out of their rage. Even if one existed, what are the chances the Oxford linguist had translated it, much less put it out on the internet somewhere? There was also the possibility that the ancients would get drunk before hearing the phrase, and that this somehow spared them the long term effects. In both ancient Norway and Greece it was apparent that alcohol was a big part of the rituals involved in going into a berserker or ecstatic state. Maybe getting black out drunk kept you from remembering the phrase in the long term. Though that wouldn’t explain why we had to sleep before it affected us, the phrase would have to work faster than it seemed too to put them in a rage state after they were drunk but before they sobered up. Unless, the phrase was actually more potent back then, or in their native languages, and worked faster, allowing them to get drunk, hear the phrase, go into a rage, then sleep it off after the battle was done or the orgies had ceased, not remembering anything, including the phrase, the next day. It was a valid theory, but how to test it? The only person here who we can be sure hasn’t heard the phrase is Cassie. And I don’t have any alcohol, although I do have tranquilizers. Dear God, I can’t believe I’m even thinking such a thing, much less writing it.

  They would get quiet when left alone, the chanting barely audibly while staring at the wall or out the window, in a near catatonic state, some of them even rocking back and forth. Occasionally one of them would get worked up for no discernible reason and start mutilating their own face or body; pulling out hair, biting their fingers or hands or clawing at their faces. One had already torn his cheeks off, and another had managed to tear her ear off. When they did this we tried to direct their attention towards us, or put some food through the slots, something to redirect their rage. Of course, then they would often start banging against the door with the hands and head until those were bloody, and we would leave so they could eventually calm down.

  I hoped beyond hope to see some change, some indication that it would wear off eventually. After all, that meant that once we were in the boat, I could be bound and fed for a few days until the rage wore off. But as yet, I had seen no indication that this was not a permanent state of being.

  I was as quiet and cautious as I could be when peeking in to watch them, trying to study them, but sometimes they still caught me and went mad, clawing at the door. I had lost two more who wouldn’t stop banging their heads against the door, even when I slipped food in. After that I kept food spiked with tranquilizers handy to try to avoid losing any more…test subjects. I guess that is what they were now. My God, they aren’t the only ones losing their humanity.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  From the journal of Jude Guerrero

  12/25/2012

  We ate and drank a bit before implementing the next part of the plan, we were going to need our strength for this. After some good lucks from the rest of the crew Tim Tom and I headed back down the stairs and to the delivery truck. They keys were hanging in the dock for the vans, and the delivery truck already had them in it, so they wouldn’t have a problem getting out of here when the time came. We had to wait a bit to make sure no affected were too close to the gate, then I ran to open it and Tim Tom started up the truck and drove through before I closed it up and jumped in, and barely in time.

  Of course, the noise of the truck brought them right to us, so I took the wheel and just started plowing through them, there wasn’t much else I could do. The truck was big but I still worried about busting a tire, but we made it through the crowd just fine and I gunned it to get over to the State Police station, having just looked at a map before we left.

  Another pack was heading our way but we had some momentum now so we got through them no problem and soon we were at the station. The windows were at about the right height, as we thought they would be, so I backed right up to one of them, the back of the truck actually hitting the wall, then pulled up just a hair and we both leapt up and headed to the back.

  We pulled the door up on the back of the delivery van and saw we were in luck, the windows weren’t even barred, we could just bust the glass and be in, and that we did.

  I wasn’t surprised to see we were alone in here, but I was still relieved. I figured all the troopers would have been called out to deal with the riots, and I was right, but someone was here. As soon as we entered I could hear them, and braced myself to go check as Tim Tom started looking for guns and ammo. They were locked up in one of the cells, emaciated, mutilated, but still angry as fuck. Affected, definitely, and it looked like they had been eating each other to stay alive, there were bones and dried crusted blood on the floor. Three of them were left, and two bodies were in the other cell, already dead. Just like our affected upstairs, they had mutilated themselves out of rage and boredom and who knows what else and why they really did it. None of them had much hair left and they were all missing ears, and some of their noses, and had clawed at their own faces before gnawing the fingers down to pulp nubs. Christ almighty.

  I left them to go help Tim Tom finds the guns and some ammo. I knew we didn’t have much time, the affected would have followed our truck and would be trying to get in here any minute now.

  And speak of the devil, I could already hear them, banging the truck. Banging hard. I got a bad feeling and tried looking out and the truck was really rocking. I couldn’t risk them turning it over so I went around to a different window, and fired a couple of shots with our newly acquired ammo. Glock .45s, nice, I was glad, 9mm wouldn’t have done shit to these psychos, but a .45 would have a much better chance of taking them down. And we also had some 12 gauge shotguns, as I had expected, glad to see that they hadn’t all been taken out to deal with the riots. We had enough guns and ammo for everyone in our crew, with a few left over. Now let’s just hope they know how to use them.

  The shots worked and got them to start coming around the building but one of them saw Tim Tom through the windows and didn’t even hesitate, it just came right through the glass. Fuck.

  I quickly loaded the shotgun and handed it to Tim Tom and armed myself with the .45 and started shooting, aiming right at the head since I was close and a good shot. Of course, that drew them all right to us, and they started on all the windows and doors.

  We started running back to the window where the van was but they were already in over there, and even after several shots they weren’t thinning out, more just kept coming in the window and then the door- stupid glass door. We were getting surrounded real quick. I grabbed the bag of guns and ammo as Tim Tom was blasting away at them with the shotgun and I motioned him to follow me. I didn’t love this idea but I didn’t see another way.

  I had already seen the keys and grabbed them as I led him to the cells and opened one while he kept them back, barely, with the shotgun. We got in with the guns and slammed the door as they were right on us, and one of them grabbed my shirt and starter pulling. I turned and shot him point blank in the face then we were in and the door was closed.

  We got all the way back to the wall and looked out at the bars and the small army of affected on the other side of them, reaching through, trying like hell to get to us. The leftovers in the other cell were at it, too, screaming and moaning like we were the last things left on earth to eat. One of them got his head through the bars and I shot it, but decided to stop and think before using any more ammo. It’s doubtful they could get their whole bodies through.

  We rested, neither of us talking, just trying to catch our breath as I assessed our situation. It wasn’t long before I saw it, outside the bars, the affected stomping all over it. I knew immediately what it was but felt my pocket where I had kept it a
nyway. It was gone, and that was it out there. My journal.

  Crap!

  I tried shooting the affected near it, hoping I could reach through and get it if I cleared a spot, but it wasn’t happening. As soon as I shot one another took its place, and even if I could shoot more it was just out of reach. I was even stupid enough to reach my arm through for a second, trying to get at it, but they were right on me, a steel grip on my arm and other arms reaching for me before a mighty yank pulled me away. Tim Tom, he had grabbed me and pulled me back asking, “Are you insane? What are you doing?”

  I pointed, trying to explain it to someone who couldn’t understand my words, much less how important that journal was to me, “My journal, it’s out there. I have to get it, I can’t…”

  “Your journal, I know, I see it.”

  “You don’t understand.”

  “Joe, I see it, OK. You can’t get to it, OK. It will be OK. We’ll get it if we can later, and if we can’t you can start writing in mine, to remember.” He reached for his, “Oh damn, mine’s in the van. But it will be OK. I’ll help you remember. We just need to get out of here right now.”

  I settled down. He was right, if we could get out soon, maybe I could get it back.

  I got as close as I could to the bars but still just out of reach and aimed carefully before shooting one in the head, then another, then another. But they didn’t thin out at all, more were just waiting out in the station to take their place, and the dead were quickly torn apart and devoured and more living stepped right up, not at all afraid of the gun, not knowing or caring that they could die. It wasn’t long before I realized it was futile, the gun shots would just attract more. Who knew how many were already in the station, and there were more outside the barred window of our cell, a lot more. How many were on this island? Would I have enough ammo to kill them all?