Cry Havoc

by William Todd Rose

  “Why won't they let me leave? Why? I just want to go.... ”

  Her palms were tightly pressed into her eye sockets and she rocked back and forth as she slowly shook her head. She took a deep gasp of air through her mouth and held it for a moment, picturing the healing white light her Yoga instructor always had them visualize. But no. That wasn't right. She tried inhaling through her nose, the snot bubbling and gurgling as she felt her diaphragm balloon out.

  That's it... breathe.

  She imagined the white light seeping into the tension in her muscles, loosening its grip on her body like salt dissolving in warm water. Diffusing through her chest and abdomen. Warm, like the rays of the sun. Soothing. Relaxing.

  Now exhaling, slowly through the mouth, envisioning a dark plume carrying away all the toxins, all the filth, all the poison that had built up in her soul. Inhale. Hold. Repeat.

  A beach, the waves of the sea crashing against the breakers. Gulls overhead, soaring high in the cloudless sky, riding the currents of the wind. The scent of the ocean carried on the breeze, salty and invigorating; warm sand between her bare toes... sunlight sparkling on deep blue waters as if billions of miniature diamonds were surfing the peaks and troughs.

  Exhale.

  Repeat.

  Polly opened her eyes.

  Had they really just stood there? Watching her break down without so much as a word? Without even a fucking sound?

  They were just as heartless and calloused as any of the savages back in town. Perhaps more so. At least those running rampant through the streets were doing what they wanted to do, however fucked up those desires may be. At least they weren't simply following orders like good little sheep.

  Fuck these people. There were other ways out of town. They couldn't be blocking them all could they?

  She stood with as much dignity as she could muster, taking a moment to brush the dust off the knees of her jeans and push the hair back from her eyes.

  “I hope you're all so very proud of yourselves.”

  Her voice was even and cold. No hints of frustration. No confusion. No fear.

  Not anymore.

  “And I hope you remember this moment clearly. When you hear that your wives and girlfriends, your sisters... your mothers.... When you hear how they were cut down and left to die on the wrong side of some fucking yellow line. I hope you remember this well.”

  The ranks were as silent as a church at midnight; but she was sure she'd planted a seed in at least one of their minds. A seed that would hopefully bloom into compassion. She may not be the one to harvest the crop she'd planted; but if at least one innocent person was able to make it to safety because of her... well, then it would have all been worth it, wouldn't it?

  She walked over to where she'd dropped her cleaver and was beginning to stoop down when there was finally a response.

  Do not attempt to pick up that weapon!

  Seriously?

  “They'll kill me, you know.”

  A statement of fact. She was beyond begging now, beyond pleading.

  I repeat, do not attempt to pick up your weapon....

  So that's how it was. That was their master plan: just let everyone kill each other off until order was restored to a depopulated city.

  But it wouldn't work. She knew it wouldn't. She'd seen the savagery, the brutality, the determination these people invested in their violence. In some ways, it almost seemed to be a matter of pride for them. Before long, this wave of mutilation would come crashing down over their precious yellow line and they would find themselves being swept away in the torrents of the flood.

  So be it.

  She stood to her full height and glared into lights that cast long shadows behind her.

  Strong.

  Defiant.

  Determined.

  “Okay, then. But just remember... I didn't want this. I only wanted to leave. You created me. You. Remember that.”

  Polly turned her back on the blockade and faced the city. She watched as the flames danced on the horizon, as black smoke billowed into the air like the wings of unholy angels. She listened to the distant sound of gunfire.

  She had no choice. If she wanted to make it out alive, she had to go back into the fray.

  But she was different now.

  Changed.

  She knew that to survive the gauntlet of butchery and death she was preparing to go through meant that, in a way, she had died out here on the other side of the yellow line. She'd tried to give the soldiers the gift of compassion because she knew that would be a luxury she wouldn't be able to afford. Not anymore.

  To survive them, she would have to become one of their own.

  No retreat, no surrender.

  It was the only way.

  “Bring it on, baby.” she whispered to the burning city. “Momma's comin' home.”

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Somewhere close by another explosion rocked the city. This one sounded big, like maybe the Gas-n-Go had given up its pumps to a Molotov or out of control car. Richard could feel the shock waves tremble through the street and into his back, almost as if a small earthquake had shaken the very foundations of an already devastated city.

  The behemoth he was pinned beneath ducked slightly as his head snapped to the side. At the same time, Richard had yanked hard on the yellow wife-beater and the shirt tore from the man's muscular frame ; as the shirt was ripping, the juicer's arms flew up, forming the shape of an X above his head as his eyes flinched shut. It was a move of pure instinct: trying to reflexively shield his face from the possibility of white-hot shrapnel, the body builder had opened himself to a much more real, and deadly, threat.

  Before the brute could recover from his mistake, Richard grabbed his own wrist with the other hand, squeezing so tightly that his entire right arm quivered. Tensing the muscles from shoulder to wrist, he rolled his body forward and upward with a quick snap. His elbow and upper forearm slammed into Meathead's throat and he heard a sound like a sharp gag as the man's Adams apple took the brunt of the blow.

  Reflexes again. More instinct as the huge bastard dropped his hands to his own throat, wrapping them around the cord-like veins and muscles as if choking himself. He struggled for a gulp of air, but Richard could feel the momentum building, could feel the battle swinging to his favor. He formed his first two fingers into a stiff V and thrust them forward, directly into Meathead's unprotected eyes. There was a slight squish, a second of something cold and wet on the tips of his fingers; the body builder's hands moved again, this time pressing the palms against his now useless eyes as he bellowed in pain. Exposing the throat again.

  Wrapping his hands around the back of the man's skull, Richard pulled him forward. At the same time, he bent at the waist as if trying to sit up. Instead, he sunk his teeth into Meathead's bottom lip and bit down with a grinding motion.. The idiot tried to pull away and there was a wet, ripping sound as a once solid piece of flesh was reduced to nothing more than a bloody strand.

  Keeping his teeth clamped down, Richard jerked his head left and right like a dog shaking the life out of a snared rabbit. Meathead was screaming now, scrambling backward across the street as blood gushed from his ravaged mouth. Richard spat the gristle out of his mouth and stood slowly; his eyes scanned his surroundings methodically, covering each inch of street until they finally rested upon what he was looking for.

  After retrieving the machete, he walked calmly toward Meathead. He stood over the blind, lipless freak and smacked the flat part of the blade against his palm as if it were a paddle.

  “Nothing personal... ”

  His voice was thick and raspy, partly from the smoke that snaked through the avenues and alleys, partly from exertion.

  “... but this is going to get ugly real fuckin' quick..”

  He didn't have time to do all the things he really wanted. He had to be satisfied with hacking off the arms and legs... but not quickly. Oh no, that would have been too good for the fallen giant. So he held back, not swin
ging the machete with as much force as he could, sinking the blade only a few inches into flesh and bone at a time. Not so much dismembering the body but rather hacking it to pieces, one carefully placed blow at a time. Now the once-mighty warrior looked more like some freak attraction from a traveling sideshow of the macabre: a bloody gaping maw where a mouth should have been, the corners extended almost back to the jawline from where the blade of the machete had been slowly drawn across what remained of Meathead's lips; no real limbs to speak of, just jagged stumps that – for a while – had caused the man-like creature to kind of rock back and forth, as if he were attempting to roll away.

  But now Richard could feel a pressure growing around his eyes, like hundreds of tiny hands that had been dipped in molten glass forcing the skin to puff outward. They were slowly narrowing, becoming nothing more than mere slits, and if he didn't do something to relieve the pressure soon he knew they would eventually close up completely. And then he'd be left, stumbling through the streets like a sacrificial cow....

  He'd considered using the machete, but was wary of that prospect. Despite the workout he'd given it, the blade was still extremely sharp. If he accidentally cut too deep, it could be very bad; and then he'd have no one to blame but himself when the unseen executioner came to finish him off. No, he needed something smaller, a razor blade perhaps. Wasn't that what they always used in the boxing movies Jane had hated with such a passion? Yeah, he was pretty sure it was.

  Directly across the street from the inchworm that had once been Meathead was a brownstone. One of those apartments had to have a razor blade somewhere in a medicine cabinet. Or even a little paring knife. Something. Anything.

  He staggered across the street and necessity forced him to rely on his ears, rather than peripheral vision, to safeguard himself. He could hear people shouting, probably a couple blocks away, a woman's shrill scream crying out like the sound of a cougar in a concrete jungle; a slight breeze that had picked up litter which rattled across the street to his right. His own footsteps slapping against the pavement. His own heartbeat.

  He started up the front steps of the brownstone, guiding himself with the smooth iron railings by his side. For a moment, he felt as if he'd stepped out of his life and been plopped down in the middle of a slasher film (which he'd always secretly enjoyed, despite what Jane considered to be a reprehensible lack of artistic merit.) It was almost like he was looking at the world through the oblong eye-holes of a mask with everything else surrounded by a perfect field of darkness. The raspy sound of his breath. The wooden door looming closer and closer with each step. Real John Carpenter type of shit.

  By the time he got to the top of the stairs, Richard had to physically tilt his head down just to see the doorknob. But something was off with his depth perception and it seemed like he had to reach much further than he should have before he was able to turn it and open the door.

  The inside of the brownstone was dark and quiet; even under optimal conditions, it would have been hard to make out details in the gloom. But his eyes now felt as if the skin around them were pulsating in perfect synchronicity with his heart, each throb sending needles of pain through his cheeks and brow. So much darkness now that he could barely make out the door with the little gold numbers on it. 1A? 1B maybe? Not that it mattered. As long as there was a razor. And as long as he could still see to find it.

  If it had been like looking through a mask before, now it was more like peering through the slightly raised slat of a venetian blind. He couldn't waste time checking to see whether or not the door was unlocked. Best to assume it wasn't. He angled his body toward the door and then ran with every ounce of strength he could summon. Part of him worried that with the depth perception problem he simply might slam into the immovable wall but, as it turned out, that wasn't an issue.

  His shoulder hit the door like a battering ram. There was a sharp crack, a metallic ting as if something metal had broken off, and the door was flying open as he tripped over his own feet and fell onto the plush carpet of the apartment.

  He could hear a child crying, very close. A woman screaming over and over get out! Get out!

  A smell like dirty socks from somewhere.

  And then something like the crackle of a bug zapper. Or a mad scientist's lab in one of those old RKO films. Something electric.

  I swear to God I'll shock your ass if you come any closer!

  That crackle and zip sound again: he could perfectly envision the little blue sparks jumping back and forth between the posts as the woman pressed the button on her stun gun to illustrate her point.

  He could picture the scene perfectly, but that was it.

  His eyes had finally swollen completely shut.

  Richard was blind.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  She had to find a weapon. And fast. Judging from the progression of the fires, the battle was slowly making its way toward this side of town. There'd been a massive explosion earlier and she'd watched as this giant fireball shot into the sky like a demon breaking free from the gates of Hell. It had almost seemed to hang in the air for a moment, the flames roiling and lashing out at the smoke and ashes in the sky. It was easy to imagine the blaze igniting the atmosphere, spreading across the heavens like a giant pool of gasoline set ablaze, blotting out the darkness above until it would seem as if the entire city were simply encased within a globe of fire. Instead, the column below it seemed to be sucked up into the mushroom and then, in the time it took to blink, the fiery apparition was gone.

  The buildings of the city had begun to close in around her again, the sounds of the fighting growing louder with each step. For a while she hadn't even heard the gunfire. Or the screams. Or the screeching of tires and rumbling of engines. It had all been background noise, static on the radio dial of reality. Every now and then, however, it had come roaring back into sharp focus as if to remind her that she couldn't allow anything to become commonplace. She had to consider every aspect of her environment if she wanted to make it out of this alive. So Polly tried to concentrate on the sounds, to use them as her guide. If they seemed to mostly be coming from the North End, then she would head west. If the growl of a motorcycle was steadily growing louder and higher in pitch, she would duck into the shadows until it passed. And this method seemed to be working rather well for her. She'd navigated through several blocks without so much as seeing a soul. Or, more importantly, without a soul seeing her.

  Now she'd reached the corner of Bentley and Jefferson. Wasn't that where that asshole Richard had gone that morning? To get the box of supplies? It had to be. She could just make out what looked to be yellow tape stretching into the distance along Jefferson. Two horizontal bands, spaced just far enough apart for a person to be able to stand comfortably between the two.

  Fuckin' yellow lines, man. If I never see another yellow line in my life, it'll be too soon.

  A sound in the alley to her right caught her attention and her head snapped to the side as her hands formed into tight fists. She didn't bother calling out “is someone there?” like those ditsy bimbos in movies and books. Of course someone was there. The sound had quite obviously been the scuffling of feet.

  From the shadows of the alley a woman emerged. She was wearing a tattered dress smeared with the same soot that darkened her cheeks and forehead. Her hair was a tangled mess, as if she had went to bed with wet hair, woke up, and went about her business without bothering to pass a comb through it. In her hands she carried a small bundle: what looked to be a fuzzy pink blanket with some sort of cartoon characters patterned on it; it was cradled in her arms at an upward angle and, through a gap in the blanket, Polly could just make out a round little forehead and tiny nose. Miraculously, it was sleeping through all of this. Which was probably a blessing, actually. The last thing this woman needed was a crying baby on her hands when she was trying to hide.

  As the woman stepped closer, Polly could see streaks in the soot on her face. As if she'd been crying and the tears had cleared swaths of cle
an skin through the grime and grit.

  “They turned you away too, didn't they? Wouldn't let you leave?”

  Polly nodded her head but remained silent, allowing this stranger to do all the talking.

  “I have a baby. A baby for crying out loud. I asked... I asked if I could lay her on the yellow line and walk away. If they could wait 'til I left and take her somewhere safe.”

  The woman had a slumped and defeated look which deepened with every step, every word... almost as if the story was the only real substance she had left and the telling of it was slowly deflating her.

  “They wouldn't do it. Why wouldn't they do it? Why wouldn't they take my baby?”

  Funny. This entire time Polly hadn't even considered the children. Where were they in all this madness? Where they huddled into basements and closets, hiding from the monsters which rampaged just outside their walls? Were their bodies piled among the faceless dead? Or, God forbid, were they joining in on the mayhem, taking out one another just like their adult role models were doing?

  “Why wouldn't they save my baby?”

  Now Jane, she probably would've thought of the children first thing. That's just the way she was. And that's probably what she'd meant when she kept muttering those poor, poor people as they watched the news. God that seemed like such a long time ago.... It was hard to believe it had only been a matter of hours. That things could deteriorate so quickly once set into motion.

  “Will you take my baby?”

  Polly finally spoke.

  “I don't want your baby, lady. You should get back in that alley and hide. You don't want to be out here.”

  The woman looked around her, as if taking in the street for the first time before turning back to face Polly, who was now only six or seven feet away.

  “Why won't you take my baby?”

  “Look, I've got enough to worry about on my own without.... ”

  The woman dropped the baby as if it were nothing more than a sack of potatoes and broke into a run. The lost and confused look had disappeared from her face, replaced with a contorted mask of rage.