by Wick Welker
“Shit, Mayberry, I don’t know who is trying to invade the U.S. I only suspect that an invasion may happen from a location in Venezuela.”
“So is it just going to be your little band of terrorists? Going to ride in on a nuke?”
“Obviously it’s not that little…”
“Who is the Sirr?” Mayberry asked. “Do you think it is just Atash Yekta?”
“I don’t know. Maybe. I only know of him. I have no idea who he actually is, where he is, or if he’s even real.”
“What is Yekta like?” Mayberry asked.
“What do you mean?”
“Well, is the guy… devout? Faithful to the cause?”
“I’ve never met a more loyal man in my life… even if that loyalty is misplaced.”
“Well, there is absolutely no way that some single asshole came right out of the blue and coordinated a global attack on this many major cities in the space of only a few days. Something else is going on... There has to be some informant giving the Sirr information.”
“How well do you know Dr. Reginald Stark?” Malik asked.
“Why?”
“Because these people worship him.”
“What?”
“Atash talks about Dr. Stark as if he were a prophet or something. He keeps going on about how it was Dr. Stark that helped usher in a new age by developing the virus.”
“Dr. Stark had nothing to do with making the virus, so I don’t know why they’d think that.”
“I don’t know why any of these people think anything. It is a full-blown cult over here. Atash will just kill people on the spot for disobeying or questioning him. Somehow, I do think I’ve found a little favor with him, because he actually lets me talk out loud, and he asks my advice.”
“Hmm.”
“What?”
“Don’t you think it’s a little suspicious that he lets you do that?”
“Maybe.”
“It may be that he’s wanting you to feel like you’re being trusted because he actually doesn’t trust you. Trying to get you to put your guard down.”
“I don’t know.”
“How did you even get away long enough to call me now? Where are you, and where is he? How do you know you’re not being watched right now?”
“Fuck, you’re making me paranoid,” Malik whispered.
“Is there anything else you can tell me?”
There was a brief silence with no response.
“Agent? Are you there?”
“I’ve got to go.” Malik flipped a switch in front of him, ending the call. He took off his headset, and looked up at Atash, who smiled.
“Malik, that was perfect. He really believed you were scared,” Atash said.
“Thank you.” He stood, tucked his chair under the table, and walked to a small window in the ship’s hull. “I am scared.”
“What are you scared of?”
“Don’t worry, I’m not scared of what you think. I’m not scared of dying, or of you, or even the Sirr.”
“Malik, I demand that you only speak of the Sirr with respect.”
“Wouldn’t you have killed someone on the spot if they talked about him like I just did?”
“Yes, I probably would.”
“Then why don’t you just kill me right now?” Malik turned from the window and walked up to Atash. “Why don’t you take out your gun and shoot me in the head?”
“Because, the Sirr has forbidden it.”
“What?”
“You are not to die right now.”
“So I can just be used, right?”
“Yes, we’re all being used. We are used until the day we die. We’re both already dead, Malik. We already got on that train, and we are surely going to die, but we have a great work to perform until we do. I know you want to be here, with me. When you use these negative words on me, I know you are just using them on yourself, because you are in a perpetual state of self-punishment until the day you die. Luckily for you, you will die soon.”
“When?” He clutched onto Atash’s sleeve, shaking. “When am I going to die?”
“You must be patient.”
*****
The days after his phone call with Mayberry stretched long as Malik spent most of his time in a small bunk in the hull of the ship. His mind was in a scramble of voices and thoughts, speeding across his consciousness like a train horn. A scar within him had been torn open when he told the men his story. Harrowed up in a haze of fear and hate, he stared up at the bed above his, trying to meditate on the texture of the cloth. He focused his breath in between his lips as he studied the small shadows cast in the ripples of the bed sheet above him. Like the ripples in a plastic bag, he thought.
The image of a plastic bag flickered in his mind as he grunted, trying to expel every thought. He reached for the calmness he had been able to find at the Nurek dam with Atash, but was constantly flooded with scenes of a hospital bed and his wife. He felt feverish but without infection. His stomach was a continuous wired ball of tension. Every so often, the movements of the waves would help him to sleep, where he would experience an occasional release from the torrent of thoughts.
“He is going through a rebirth,” he would hear Atash say to the men, as they slept at night. “We must not bother him until he wants to be bothered.”
One morning, after several days without leaving the hull, Malik walked out onto the deck and climbed atop a large wooden crate. Standing, he looked out over the ocean, and the small waves that disappeared in the distance. He had now realized that he had no idea where the ship was going. He had no idea what they were doing next and found a small comfort in the mystery of where he was. He enjoyed the lack of information at his disposal and felt freed by the ignorance that was imposed on him. After years of perfecting the skill of intelligence gathering, he was relieved to not care anymore.
He often retreated down to the hull below to look back up at the same bed sheet for hours, as his thoughts crushed in on any attempts to mediate. Suicide, as always, accompanied everything he did, but he had grown accustomed to the fleeting thoughts of sticking a gun in his mouth or jumping off the side of the ship. He was no longer shocked by the prospect of death, and with that, he found strength in living. There must be something here, he thought. We are doing something real here. I’m not talking about smart phones and coffee shops or how old my friend’s children are. He could slowly feel his past wash away from him.
For the next two weeks he cycled between lying in the hull for a day or two and meditating on the deck with the rest of the men. They all spoke little, and Atash spoke to him even less. Seeing the same open ocean everyday reinforced the idea to Malik that the past world had completely disappeared. It is entirely gone for all I know.
“Don’t forget, Malik, even this ocean, which you love, is as much an illusion as anything else. Do not fall in love with this ocean, brother,” Atash said as Malik stood on top of the wood crates.
The men grew excited on the day that they finally saw land ahead on the eastern horizon. The coastline grew larger as the ship moved with each hour, and by midday, they could make out buildings and other boats. As the land became closer a horn blew out over the deck. Atash ushered all the men to come to the ship’s bridge.
Malik heard the horn from below and made his way to the deck, where everyone had assembled around the metal staircase that led up to the bridge. The men silently filed into a line and crammed into the bridge of the ship, where the captain, a small man from Turkey named Badi, was seated over the controls.
All the men eventually crammed into the small bridge and found spots, sitting cross-legged on the green linoleum floor, or leaning against the walls. Atash stood in the middle of them, facing the opposite direction of the captain to address the group that was seated. “My brothers, we are arriving. This small group, these men that you see around you, have been chosen from the world to be instruments of change. I adore and admire your work in Seoul, and would admonish you, my brothers, tha
t your dedication is yet to be tested before we die. I am going to show you that we will not die until our work on this carnal planet is over. I would that you recognize the power that is within the brotherhood and within each and every one of you.” Atash unzipped his jacket, producing a revolver from his chest. “My brother, Badi, are you ready to die?”
Without turning, the captain Badi made an adjustment on the control panel, and then spoke loudly. “Yes, brother, I am ready to die.”
Atash turned at his hips and looked over at Badi, while bringing the gun to the back of the captain’s head. Badi continued looking forward through the windows of the bridge when Atash placed the muzzle at the base of his skull and pulled the trigger, spraying blood and bits of bone over the controls and windows. Badi slumped forward in his seat and slowly sank down to the floor, falling over a man seated below him.
Atash put the revolver back into his jacket. “No one here knows how to drive this ship. We are all going to die, but it won’t be here on this ship today. Do you brothers trust me?”
“Yes,” a unison voice rose from the group.
“Let us wait then.” Atash turned, stepping over the men that were seated around him, and sat down at the captain’s chair. He brought up his hand and pressed forward on a bloodied throttle, which produced a shudder throughout the ship as it sped up.
Malik braced himself on the corner edge of the wall where he stood. As the ship accelerated forward, he looked out the front windows and saw the coast quickly approached with dotted fishing boats, unaware of the strong waves surging behind them.
Chapter Ten: Mexico City
The van was in a constant bombardment as the infected crowd grasped loosely against the white van. Dave brought his blade down, severing dozens of fingers with one swing. He swung down at their arms and hands then lifted the blade up and turned a few degrees along the tiny roof, to bring it back down again. He saw that every single one of them had their eyes trained on every movement he made. The tiny white square of the van’s roof had become a precarious island in the ocean of the infected horde.
Dave’s shoulders ached with the fatigue of lifting his blade over and over again. Sweat poured from his eyebrows and dripped down onto the faces of the infected. Their expressions had become hollowed out of personality, leaving behind a thin shell of cheekbones and gaping mouths, aching for flesh. Dave had no time for thoughts. His muscles and nerves drove his body in a continuous circle around the roof, creating a small threshold free of the encroaching crowd only for a moment, until he turned his back to another side. He thought about his sidearm, but not for the purpose of defending himself.
As the crowd heaped around the van, several of the infected began to crowd-surf along the tops of heads, crawling and punching their way to Dave’s position. A thin man approached the van from behind and knocked down a line of people below him as he positioned his knee on the roof behind Dave.
Dave noticed the sound of the thin metal of the roof bending inward and turned, swinging his blade out, while kicking another person below him. The blade cut deep into the infected man’s abdomen and stuck halfway to the other side. He pulled it back, opening the man’s belly, and dumping his rotting bowels onto the roof. He swung the blade sideways, removing the man’s head, and then kicked him off with his body crashing down into the crowd below.
As soon as Dave was able to get his footing, another body came crashing into him from the opposite side, and before he could react, another followed from right behind. Lifting the blade above his head, it was suddenly knocked from his hands by the blunt force of yet another person from the crowd that had climbed atop the van. Kneeling, Dave finally unclasped his sidearm, and brought it up to his own head.
He paused for just one moment, thinking and knowing that he had no other options. He wanted to first feel the sting of human teeth sink into his skin before he pulled the trigger; he wanted to be sure there was no other way off the island where he was marooned.
He closed his eyes and waited, but the bite never came. Instead, the infected on the roof of the van toppled over him in one simultaneous action. Two people limply fell on his back and rolled off, slamming onto the flimsy roof. Looking out past his shoulder, he saw that all the flailing arms and open mouths had disappeared. He stood and saw the lifeless corpses of hundreds of the infected that had instantaneously fallen to the street. The entire street fell silent, as every person of the infected mob had become a motionless corpse. He brought his handgun to his side, knowing exactly who had saved him.
Dave spun around and saw the bulky front end of the shocker tank as it plowed down the street, crushing bodies underneath its clanking, metal tread. The tank towered over one-story high with large cables threading in and out of generators and metal coils. It’s bulky compartments squeezed in between the buildings, scraping off paint and siding. A large, oval electromagnetic pulse emitter was fixed on the upper hatch of the tank, splayed open like an enormous clam. A small hatch at the bottom opened with a black helmeted person emerging from within. As the tank approached, Dave made out the gaunt jawline and brunette hair of Michaels.
“Tripps!” she yelled out.
Dave put his arms up. “Michaels! Holy shit, you saved my ass!” He stepped forward, slipping on the sleek surface of the van, which made him tumble down the windshield into a pile of motionless bodies below. “I was this close,” he said showing his fingers to her as he picked himself up, “to blowing my fucking brains out!”
Michaels opened the hatch and climbed out of the tank as it came to a stop. She unclasped a handgun that had a single large block of rectangular plastic where the barrel would normally be. “Damn, we should’ve waited a little longer,” she said smiling, climbing down from the tank.
From the hatch, Dave saw Douglas’ head peak followed by his massive shoulders slanting sideways to fit his frame through. “Tripps! What the hell!” he yelled out.
Dave had made his way across the corpse-laden road and met Michaels. She reached the rectangular handgun out to him. “I could’ve used one of these about twenty minutes ago,” he said, taking the gun. “My sweet, EMP-M9. Is there a reason we didn’t just parachute in with these?”
“What happened to you?” she asked, pulling out a rifle with a similar rectangular block at the barrel that hung from her shoulder.
“It happened really fast, I got all choked out by the smoke, had to cut myself loose.” He turned the gun around, inspecting the battery life.
Yen came up from behind as several others from the squad emptied out of the shocker tank. “Whoo!” he shouted out. “EMP technology! You never really believe it’s going to work until you see an entire street of the infected drop dead right in front of your eyes. I guess the mighty Dr. Stark was right.” He walked around bodies, nudging them with his boot tip. “These fuckers aren’t moving at all.”
“It’s exactly what I saw back in Richmond at the first outbreak, when they blew the nukes in the sky. An entire hospital full of people just fell to the ground at once,” Dave said looking at Michaels. “You bet your ass that tank worked.”
“All right!” Douglas yelled out to the men emptying from the tank.
“Hey!” Dave quietly shouted at him. “We need to be quiet, the horde is still everywhere that wasn’t in the radius of that EMP.”
“Yeah, yeah, all right everybody, get over here.” Douglas made a small attempt to quiet his voice, which immediately grew louder again. “We’re not going to get much farther with that tank. The streets in this part of town are way too narrow. We’re going to form a Psi formation and move through the streets while we leave a contingent crew here back at the tank. I’ve been getting some updates, and our destination is several blocks south. I’ve been given specific coordinates for a building that is believed to house known terrorist contacts.” Douglas turned and looked at the opposite end of the street from the shock tank. “We need to go that way.”
The squad fell into a backward “W” shaped formation that spanned the
street. The three points in front maintained their angle of assault directly ahead, while the side members walked at a slanted angle, ready for a flank attack. At the rear of the formation two other squad members walked backward, facing any surprise attacks from behind. All squad members had their blades out and EMP firearms holstered on their sides or backs.
Dave walked as a flank man in the formation. The squad moved down the street and came to a bottleneck as the road went under a small bridge of housing. Coming through the other side, they could see that the EMP easily went through all the buildings where the infected lay lifeless on the ground. Without stopping, the group moved down this second street, scanning the small alleyways for any movement. Through several more streets, they saw the extensive radius that the shocker tank had had; it appeared to have taken out three to four blocks of the infected with one pulse.
It was on about the fifth block that Dave saw movement in the collapsed horde: a small wrist twitch or a jerking knee. “Everyone quiet now,” Douglas said.
Passing an alleyway, Dave saw a man walking by a metal stairwell that clung to the side of a small villa. The man was rhythmically jerking his head up and down and scraping his nails along the metal railing of the staircase. Dave looked up at Douglas at the top of the formation.
“Go take care of him,” Douglas told him.
Breaking away from the group, Dave stepped carefully over the fallen bodies, and went down the narrow alleyway toward the man who hadn’t looked up. As he got closer the man suddenly fell to his knees, banging his head forward into the staircase. Dave held his blade out as he neared and brought it above his head as the infected man arched his neck up. Dave was about to bring his blade down onto his neck, but stopped. The infected man had turned his head and was licking the thin metal bars that led down from the railing of the staircase. After licking for a moment, he then turned his head and crunched his jaw down on the bars, shattering multiple teeth from his mouth. He turned his bloody mouth and looked up at Dave.
