36 Hours (42 page)

The soldier
murderer
took Hannah up to the desk, said, “We have an urgent one. Risk of infection.”

The receptionist said, “We’re stocked full right now…”

“Just take her. It’s just antiseptic, stitches, gauze. It won’t take but ten minutes. I want to get these people some food and sleep.” Fake Samaritan. Trying to look good? Your ‘beloved conscious’ won’t save you from your murderous acts. There is no restitution.

The receptionist nodded and allowed the soldier to take her into a backroom. Shelley and I sat on the floor. There were no seats. Shelley didn’t say anything.

I looked up at the ceiling, at the swirling fans that groaned and creaked. I heard the aches of those around me, those with sulfurous memories, those with another life, shattered and torn dreams and hopes. The fan rocked back and forth.
Why do you refuse to help? How come, no matter how much I cry, no
matter how much I plea, no matter the passions and energy, you just watch on
and do nothing? Do you get some sort of perverse pleasure out of watching me
suffer? Is my barely scraping through in life entertainment for you? Is that why
I exist? So you can watch me, throw me bad luck and misfortune and tragedy,
and just laugh as the world burns to Hell? Your so-called Bible says you really
care – well, I’m seeing lots of your care around here! Yeah, you sure do love
everyone! You sure did love my sister whom you let get shot in front of my face!

You sure do love my mom and dad who dedicated their lives to you! You don’t
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care. I don’t believe that anymore. You may say you care, just to get our
obedience, but do you really care? No! You’re sitting in a box seat and clapping
as we go through troubles and problems and pain! You think our lives are
grand stories of Macbeth of Hamlet! Life is a roll of the dice – you don’t have
any good and lovely plans. That’s suck a crock. You lay out rules for us to
follow, then watch as we stumble around. All I wanted was a simple life. A small
home, a simple job, a wife who loves me, a family to call my own. I didn’t dream
of anything big or spectacular. I didn’t want to the change the world. But you
can’t even give that to me, you’ve taken all of it away from me, tore it from my
hands! And you ask me to follow you? Why do you think I would ever follow
you? Let me tell you something now. I hope you’re listening, because I want you
to hear this forever, even after I’m dead: I hate you. I hate you, I hate you, I
hate you.

The soldier returned. He approached me and Shelley. “She’s getting the stitches. Once she’s done, you will be taken to the refugee camp, and then you’ll be redistributed. The whole city is in a state of Marshall law; no one is allowed on the streets, everyone has to remain where they were the moment the martial law was established, be it home or work or school. We have several families offering to take in refugees for a warm bed and some food. We will be redistributing you three together, but that might take a few hours. You’ll just have to lay low.”

Shelley nodded. “Okay.”

I was silent.

The soldier looked down at me. “What’s your name?”

I didn’t answer.

“Come with me.” He went outside.

I didn’t want to go, but I went. My anger drove me. We went outside the doors and stood against the building. I leaned against a palm tree and we watched the airplanes landing, the trucks moving back and forth, distant cackling gunshots. The soldier lit a cigarette and began smoking. He offered me one. I refused. He took several drags, then said, “I’m sorry. I really am. From the depths of my heart. I’m just a kid fresh out of college. I made the mistake of signing on to the National Guard for college funds. They called me up right after my pre-spring graduation. My family lived here so I was stationed here. I don’t blame you for hating me. I hate myself.”

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He took another smoke. “Before the planes started coming in, Marshall law was established and we were forced to go house-to-house, building-to-building. Anyone bitten was to be put down immediately. There were a few cases of the pandemic here, but we ousted it quickly. It is a miracle, I know. We killed maybe fifteen hundred infected. Some had turned, some hadn’t. One of them was my little brother. He was five years old.”

A tear dotted his face. “He had gone to school, and some kid there had turned. My brother had been bitten, but the principal and nurse restrained the kid. Both of them were bitten, too. We put down the infected kid, then proceeded to put down the principal and nurse. We then had all the kids locked in their classrooms, and did full-body searches. Only two others were bitten. A little girl and my brother. I wouldn’t let anyone else do it. I did it myself. I just thought…

I thought it was wrong for me to take other peoples’ lives, to take other peoples’

friends and families, when I wasn’t brave enough to do the same no matter the circumstance. I remember my little brother just looking at me, and I shot him between the eyes. I’ve never felt so cruel, so evil, so… hated by God.”

A truck rolled around the side of the building. Several soldiers sat in the bed, gripping their rifles and sweating in body dress uniforms. The soldier
not so
murderer
jumped on as it passed, not even looking back, and crawled into the bed of the truck. It joined several others as it drove into the darkness. I went back inside.

Shelley looked up, said nothing. I didn’t brief him. I felt bad for yelling slander and curses at the soldier. I wasn’t special. I wasn’t an exclusive case. I looked about the waiting room. No one talked. They were either silent or crying. Silent because they knew it was over, and couldn’t get the past 24 hours – had it already been 24 hours? Yes, it had – out of their heads. Crying because, on arrival with a hope of another world, their friends and loved ones had been cut down to ‘halt the spread of infection’, a technical phrase that meant killing the unlucky.

There was a gunshot inside the medical ward, an echoing scream. I hung my head.

Hannah came from the doors she’d entered through. Her arm looked the same, except with new gauze. Soldiers flanked her. She pointed to us and the soldiers said, “Come with us, please. We’ll get you some food and a nice bed.”

He led us out a back door. Before us, in the middle of the courtyard of San Francisco International Airport, were hundreds of large tents, each sporting Anthony Barnhart

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dozens of beds. There was another tent holding a soup kitchen with a huge line. Most people, though, had already eaten, we’re hungry, or just sat together under the tents. The soldier said to find us some beds, to get some food. One bowl and one piece of bread per person. He vanished back inside the building. Over the rims of the tents, the sun began to rise, spreading rippling light between the towering skyscrapers and pushing away a night that would forever be remembered as one the world won’t ever forget. Unbeknownst to my eyes, several trucks ladled with soldiers were speeding towards the inland suburbs. Unbeknownst to anyone, this newly discovered paradise was simply the harbinger of Hell.

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Saturday, April 24, 2004

“I came to cast fire on the earth, and would that it were already kindled! I have a
baptism to now be baptized with, and how great is my distress until it is
accomplished! Do you think that I have come to give peace on earth? No, I tel you,
but rather division. For from now on in one house there will be five divided, three
against two and two against three. They wil be divided, father against son and son
against father, mother against daughter and daughter against mother…”

--Luke 12:49-53

6:00 a.m.

The Suburbs

Redemption is in the blood

The playground

A Jewish family sat in a circle, holding hands, praying over the Holy Torah. Children, orphaned, sat in faraway corners, crying. A baby, left alone, sobbed and screamed over the ruckus of moving around, eating, more crying. People sat in silence, staring into space, oblivious, drowned in their thoughts and worries. Some held pictures of family, hands shaking, and would drop their heads into their hands, tears running down the arms. Some who ate just threw it up. Others held bowls of soup in their hands, staring at their muddy reflections, suddenly not hungry anymore. Some went up for seconds. Several had knelt down and were praying, passionately, crying and sobbing, yelling. Hundreds upon hundreds of people, tightly packed, shoulder-to-shoulder. Shelley said, “I’m getting something to eat. Do you guys want me to get you some soup?”

Hannah said yes. I shook my head no. Shelley walked off. I said, “Let’s find a place to sit. Reserve a cot for Shelley.” The place was flooding. More and more people kept being landed inside, and only every now and then a truck would show up to ferry people to new locations. Soldiers patrolled the rooftops. The rumble of trucks echoed beyond the buildings. The sun was coming up, peeking Anthony Barnhart

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its frosted eye, and the palm trees quivered in a westerly breeze. The smell of salt lingered in the air.

We pushed our way through the unfamiliar faces, the scattered accents. A woman came up to us, grabbed us, cried, “Have you seen my baby?” We just looked at her, dazzled, and she continued on to another person, and another. Someone sat on a cot, slowly cutting himself with his fingernails, muttering incantations under his breath. No one tried to stop him. Nothing was odd anymore.

Hannah spied a trio of cots, and we took two of them, just watching the people, saying nothing. Ashlie was gone.

A man sat down beside us. He was about eighty years old, and wore ragged clothes. Blood speckled the pant legs. He said, “Where you kids from?”

I looked at him, not wanting to talk. Hannah answered, “Ohio.”

“Ohio. That fell fast.”

She nodded. “Yes it did.”

“What was it like?”

I closed my eyes. This man was pressing.

Hannah shook her head. “I don’t really want to talk about it. Is that okay?”

“No one wants to talk about it. But it’s times like these we need to talk.”

“I know. I just don’t really want to talk. I’m tired.”

“Are you hungry?”

“Our friend is getting food,” I interjected. “You’re sitting on his cot. Could you please move?”

He didn’t budge. “Don’t get comfortable.”

“We’re on the list, yes, I know.”

“The list? The list for relocation? That’s not what I’m talking about. Tell me, what was it like in Ohio? Where did you live? In a city? The country? Suburbia?

All fell, you know. All were overrun. Overrun. We talk about it like it’s a war. I guess it is, though, isn’t it? If you listen hard enough, over all the sounds of the people, you can hear it. Distant gunshots and explosions. The Army is everywhere, soldiers on the streets, in the buildings. But guess what? I’ve been here six hours, through the night. I watched from the rooftops. Flashes of light in the distant, balls of flickering fire, silent because they were so far away. They aren’t silent anymore. These people, whatever they are, they don’t fear. They don’t get scared. I tried a little experiment a few hours ago with a sniper rifle. I lit up one of them, right in the heart, center mass. Nothing. Shot in lungs, gave Anthony Barnhart

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him a full clip, shot off his legs, nothing! But I shot him in the head and he turns into a wet bag of crap. So I started shooting them all in the head, didn't work. Every time you nail one, two popped up in its place! It's like that hobbit dragon thing, where you cut off one head and two grow back - an exercise in fertility. That’s how these things work. You can’t just shoot them all. There’s so many of them! We don’t have enough firepower! And they seek us. They seek living flesh, more victims. They’re coming
here
, right to San Francisco. Don’t get cocky. They have no plan, creatures of instinct. Eat our food, wear our clothes, use our stuff; we're just the holdouts. Holdouts. The world is the freaking Alamo – it’ll fall. It’s just a matter of time.”

“San Francisco is-“

“Secure? Hah! So was Salt Lake City! That’s where I came from. National Guard said they had everything under control. Now it’s a ghost town, run full of these creatures. The holdouts are vanishing. San Francisco will fall, too.
It’s just
a matter of time
. They’re getting closer. You can see it on the soldiers’ faces as they return from the suburbs. Shell-shocked, terrified, mortified. Fewer return than go in. So don’t get comfortable. That’s all I’m saying. Because they’ll get here – and we’ll be fish in a barrel. So eat up. Energize! You’ll have to run again. Don’t want to faint.”

He stood, giving us friendly nods, and slipped away. Hannah looked at me as if wondering,
Is he right
? I didn’t answer. Shelley returned with some soup. “I tried some. It sucks. Potato and cheese, or something.”

I spooned some into my mouth, taking it in, savoring the somewhat stale taste. Hannah splashed some on the grass at her feet. “It tastes like soapy dish water.”

“Better eat, kiddo,” I said. “Don’t get comfortable.”

Shelley swallowed. “What? Are we being relocated soon?”

“Something like that,” I mumbled.

Hannah: “The man’s crazy.”

“The man?”

“Some guy came by, saying that we’re fish in a barrel for the infected.”

“The Army is keeping them away, right?”

“Right,” Hannah said, but it was almost a question.

Sporadic gunfire in the distance. I set the bowl underneath the cot and said, “I have to check this out. Anyone care to join me?”

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“Where to?” Shelley asked.

“The rooftop. Trying to see what this guy is talking about.”

“Sounds good. It’s so crowded here. I don’t like crowds. An introverted guy, I think.”