Zombiestan

by Mainak Dhar

  David realized that they were doing exactly what he was planning-to try and get to safety before the Sun set.

  About fifteen minutes later, he heard a buzzing sound and looked up to see an OV-22 Osprey come into view. The tilt rotor craft could take off and land vertically like a helicopter, and then fly in level flight like an aircraft. The Osprey landed just a few meters away and David sprinted to it, feeling a huge wave of relief wash over him as he entered it. There was only one soldier inside the craft.

  'Sargeant, didn't you get anybody else?'

  The man looked at David, a haunted look in his eyes.

  'None of the others were clean.'

  The full extent of the catastrophe hit David as he asked why he was not being flown to the USS Kearsage. The soldier turned away before answering.

  'Sir, ten infected men are on board. Last I heard the skipper was debating whether to kill them before Sunset. They have already authorized cruise missile strikes on bases where only infected men are left.'

  David braced himself as the craft took off, wondering if things had indeed gotten so bad that they could be considering killing their own soldiers? The rest of the ride passed in total silence till they reached the Shamsi airbase in southern Pakistan. David had never been here before, but he knew it was the major staging ground for the US drone effort over Afghanistan. He could see soldiers milling around, as other choppers and Ospreys landed, bringing in evacuees like him. The Sun was now about to set, and he saw that many of the men and women around him looked scared. He wondered if he looked any different.

  Shamsi had once been a private airbase where rich Arab sheiks used to come for their falconry. Over the last few years, it had been transformed into a state of the art facility from which hundreds of Predator strikes had been launched. Officially, the base did not exist. David was still standing near the flight line when he heard a sudden silence descend upon the base. He looked up to see what everyone else was seeing.

  The Sun had just begun to set.

  A soldier came up next to him, talking to nobody in particular.

  'They say the base is clean, but who knows what's out there?'

  Another soldier spoke up.

  'We've got five Ospreys with Gatling guns and fixed base defences that could stop a battalion. I don't think we need to worry.'

  Having been through what he had in the last two days, David was not so sure about that. How did you keep out attackers you could not kill?

  Nothing seemed to happen for some time, but most of the soldiers were so much on edge that they refused to take their packs off. Most wandered about, carrying loaded weapons, waiting for what would be coming at them over their walls.

  When the attack began, it was as unexpected as it was vicious. David, like everyone else, had expected hordes of zombie like creatures trying to come in on foot. Instead, a huge truck came rolling towards the base's main gate, being pushed by a horde behind it. The machine gun fire bounced off it, and it stopped just short of the gate when three anti-tank missiles hit it. As the truck exploded, David could hear no cheering. Everyone inside had just learnt a terrifying lesson-the infected were not just mindless hordes, they were learning, and adapting, even trying crude tactics. And it had just been two days since it had begun.

  A commotion at the rear of the base had soldiers scrambling there. He heard someone screaming.

  'There's got to be at least a thousand of them coming!'

  David scrambled up a watch tower to get a better look, unslinging his rifle, and he saw a chilling sight. As far as the eye could see, there were infected men and women trying to enter the base. The soldiers were unloading bullets into them as fast as they could, but they would get hit, fall and then get back up. Several of them got tangled in the barbed wire fence, but the others climbed over them. David took aim, seeing a now familiar black-turbaned head, with a yellowed face below. He squeezed one round, seeing one attacker fall. To his surprise, this one did not get back up. Did head shots kill them? Did all those zombie movies actually get that one right? He shook his head sadly as a minute later, the man, if that was what the creature could be considered anymore, got up and rejoined his friends in storming the base. Head shots didn't kill, but it did put them down for some time. David wondered if he'd stay alive long enough to put that knowledge to any use. The thought that he could turn into a mindless creature like those milling around in front of him was too horrible to even contemplate.

  As the attackers began swarming through the base, David saw some soldiers turn their weapons on themselves, preferring to die instead of being turned into the monsters that now teemed around them. David considered the idea, but then Rose's face came before his eyes. He had to live. He had to get out.

  One of the Ospreys had its rotors on, a young pilot standing nearby, too terrified to do anything. David ran to him.

  'Son, can you fly this?'

  The pilot nodded.

  'Then let's get out of here!'

  The man just looked at him blankly.

  'But I haven't got my flight orders yet.'

  David realized he was in shock, so he grabbed him by the shoulders hard and shook him.

  'Kid, see those monsters coming? They'll rip your neck out in a second. Let's get out while we can.'

  He climbed into the Osprey's cockpit as the pilot prepared for takeoff. The base was now teeming with the infected, and he could see fallen soldiers everywhere. He now also knew that the next day, as soon as the Sun set, these soldiers would join the hordes who had attacked them. As they flew by, he saw the roads filled with mobs of the infected, moving in their slightly stiff gait.

  He looked straight ahead, and felt something wet on his face. He checked to see if he was bleeding, and saw that without realizing it, he had been crying.

  'Kid, where do we go?'

  The pilot now seemed to be more in control, but his hands still shook as he checked the map.

  'Sir, I'd go to India. It may not have spread there so fast.'

  A few minutes of flying later, David asked him which city they were flying over. The pilot looked at him with tired eyes.

  'Does it matter? It's all Zombiestan down there.'

  THREE

  Hina saw that the Sun was about to set and then drew the curtains close. She had gone to college in the morning but had found it almost deserted. The Principal, who lived just off the campus, had looked at her as if she were out of her mind.

  'Ms. Rahman, I would go home and be with my family if I were you.'

  And so she had come home, but she had nobody or nothing to come home to. She realized that if her family had still been with her, she would have reacted very differently. She could understand why her colleagues were in a state of panic, because they were terrified about losing people or things precious to them in the chaos that threatened to engulf them when the Sun set. Hina had nothing or nobody to lose. And certainly she had nowhere else to run to. She had lived in this house for the last thirty years, and could not imagine going anywhere else. Her children were still not picking up their phones, and while she hoped that they were fine, she realized with a heavy heart that even when things had been normal, they had always been too busy to take calls from their forgotten old mother back home.

  So she sat down in front of the one thing that was precious to her-her writing. The shelf in front of her study desk was lined with her books, and as she booted up her laptop, she wondered when people would read books again. Would there be a time in the future when people would write books about the time humanity had gone crazy under the influence of some mysterious plague and nearly destroyed itself? She certainly hoped so. It would be such a waste if nobody read books again.

  She began typing, but found that she just could not concentrate with the sounds of panic coming from outside. The sound of people trying to get home; of people honking their car horns and of people shouting at others to get out of their way. As soon as the Sun set, she suddenly felt an ominous silence descend. It was as if some g
iant unseen hand had just pressed the `mute' button on the world. Hina peeked out through the curtains and saw that everyone on the street had stopped to look at the setting Sun.

  Then it began.

  The first sign of the chaos that was to come was the sound of guns being fired. There was a police station nearby and she figured the cops were trying to keep things under control. Then she heard screaming, and then the guns stopped firing. She had opened a new bottle of wine and finished her glass in a long swallow, her heart hammering as she wondered what would come next. People on the road were running now, and several were screaming. There were desperate cries for help outside her home, and Hina wanted to do something to help. But what could a frail, old woman possibly do?

  Her home was an old colonial style house with two floors that would in today's market cost a fortune to buy. Her study was on the second floor, and she looked out the window to witness a scene that would forever be etched in her mind. There was a mob of people; no creatures would be a more appropriate description, transformed by the infection to mindless wild animals. They all seemed to be wearing black turbans, men and women alike, and with their tattered clothes, yellow skin and bloodied bodies, looked nothing like the people they must have been just a day ago. They wandered through the street in their stiff, loping gait and every time they saw anyone, they would attack like a pack of wild animals, surrounding their prey and scratching and biting till they brought them down. Hina saw one or two young men try and fight back, and she watched in horror as they were killed, their necks broken by their crazed attackers.

  She watched a young girl, perhaps no more than fifteen, who was running from one house to another, pleading with the occupants to let her in, to give her some refuge. But there was no safety anywhere today. The creatures had entered several homes along the road and the screams coming from inside them told Hina what the fate of their occupants would have been. The young girl was now directly below Hina's house, and while Hina had turned off all the lights in her home, she saw her peeking out the parted curtains.

  `Please let me in. Please help me.'

  Hina looked straight at the girl's eyes and then saw four of the creatures moving towards her. Hina could have gone down and let the girl in, but then the creatures would no doubt see her. She stayed rooted where she was, paralyzed by fear, as the girl tried to run, only to be encircled and then brought down by several of her attackers. Crying at her weakness and ashamed at having done nothing to help, Hina hid under her study table, praying that they would think there was nobody home. When the sounds of the attack outside abated after about five minutes, Hina worked up the courage to part the curtains and look down. The girl was lying there, curled in a fetal position, blood all around her. Suddenly, her body twitched and spasmed and then after a sudden, violent jerk, lay still again. Then the girl suddenly sat upright and looked at Hina. Her face was yellowed and bloodied, and her eyes narrowed in hate. She scrambled around herself, as if looking for something, and then tore off a portion of her black skirt to tie around her head. Hina's heart was pounding. Everyone had said that the infection took one day to transform its victims. It seemed that the effects were now taking hold of their victims in ten minutes or less, transforming healthy, decent people into bloodthirsty, crazed killers. No wonder so many countries had gone under so fast. The girl pointed straight at Hina and emitted a shrill, ear-piercing scream. Several of the other creatures started to come towards her. Hina knew that she was trapped and with no way out.

  Less than two kilometers away, Mayukh's mother was struggling to start the car, dropping the keys again because of her badly shaking hands. Mayukh saw that his mother was on the verge of a breakdown, and took hold of her hands.

  'Mom, let me drive.'

  She handed over the keys without any protest. His mother had believed that they would be safe in their government colony, with the armed guards who normally did duty outside. However, by evening, it was clear that she had been badly mistaken. When Mayukh had gone out at about four to see what was happening outside, he saw that all but one of the guards had left their posts. The remaining man had shrugged at Mayukh.

  'They all have families. I can't blame them for wanting to get home before Sunset.'

  The TV channels had reported that as the Sun slowly set over Asia, the darkness took hold over one country after another. The pattern was the same. As soon as the Sun set those who had been infected transformed into bloodthirsty creatures who savaged anyone in sight.

  Mayukh inserted the keys and they left the colony. They had packed their car with as many provisions as they could, and Mayukh had the loaded handgun next to him. His father had called earlier in the day saying that if their colony did not appear safe then they were to try and get to the old Kotla stadium, which was being heavily fortified as a safe haven. Mayukh's mother had waited till the last moment, perhaps too long, to decide that they were better off trying to reach the stadium instead of staying at home. The Sun was about to set and Mayukh turned to look at his mother. He had often hated her for her nagging, but now he saw that she was looking to him to lead the way. Seeing his mother so vulnerable scared him more than anything else, reminding him that things were well and truly out of control now.

  Mayukh was jolted back to reality by the repeated staccato sound of guns firing nearby.

  'Mom, the firing seems to be coming from the police station. We can't go that way any more. Let's try and find another route.'

  His mother just nodded.

  While he did find another road, it meant he had to drive through a narrow road crammed with houses and narrow alleys on either side. That was why he never saw the three men who ran into their car. His mother screamed as the window on her side shattered and a yellow, bloodied arm reached in. Mayukh slammed his foot on the accelerator and their attackers were left behind as their car shot ahead. Another infected man came right in front of his car and Mayukh made the mistake of trying to swerve out of the way. The car hit a small shop on the sidewalk and Mayukh was temporarily winded as his head hit the steering wheel. He could hear his mother shouting.

  'Hurry up, they're coming!'

  Mayukh reversed the car, feeling the thump of an impact as he hit someone or something, and then resumed down the road. There were now people running all over the street, many of them pursued by screaming attackers.

  A group of five infected men emerged from the shadows to their left and Mayukh turned the car into a gut-wrenching turn and sped into one of the alleys to his right. As he exited the alley on the main road, just a hundred meters to the right, attackers were beginning to break down the front door of Hina Rahman's house.

  ***

  David came out of the Osprey, his rifle at the ready. In the fading light, he tried to make out if anyone was there at the airfield, but it seemed deserted. On their way in, the young pilot had tried to make contact with the Indian Air Force base at Hindon, just outside Delhi and also the International Airport. But both had been closed to all traffic, in anticipation of the chaos that was to unfold at Sunset. Instead, he had been advised to put down at the Safdarjung airstrip in central Delhi, which was used for microlights and gliders of flying clubs. With the ability to land vertically, the Osprey had no issue putting down. But now, David and the pilot, whose name he hadn't even asked, had to somehow make their way to the US Embassy. David wondered if that would provide any real safety, but it was better than taking one's chances on the streets.

  'Kid, what's your name?'

  'Stan.' The pilot looked pale and his hands were shaking.

  'Get your handgun. Have you ever been in combat before?'

  The pilot shook his head, and David wondered why he of all people had to babysit this kid.

  'Look, just stay close and you'll be fine. When I ask you to shoot at someone, do it and aim for the head. Got it?'

  Stan nodded, his eyes widening at the prospect of having to come close enough to one of the infected attackers to have to shoot him or her in the head. The stre
ets of the Indian capital were in a state of complete chaos, clogged with cars and people who were trying to get to safety. David looked at his GPS. The US embassy was about ten kilometers away. In a straight line and without having to worry about being attacked by crazed mobs, he would have made it there in less than an hour and a half. But now, they would have to trek through a hostile landscape in the dark. They had been walking for no more than ten minutes when they saw the first evidence of the carnage around them. Cars were scattered across the road and people were running in a state of panic. David saw the cause for their panic when he spotted a group of a dozen or more of the infected walk into view. The streetlights were still on, so he could see the attack unfold clearly. They split into pairs and then attacked their chosen prey, one bringing the target down with a tackle to the leg or waist, and the other then coming in for the bite, usually to the shoulders or neck.

  David watched, a bit stunned by what he saw. The black-turbaned wraiths he saw were not just mindless zombies, they were actually using some sort of tactics and thinking, even if that intelligence was as of now no more than what a pack of wild animals would have demonstrated. What he saw next was even worse. The victims seemed to lie lifeless for a few minutes, and then they got up, transformed into the same kind of creatures who had attacked them.