I heard the latch turning on the door.
70 Minutes Until the Aerial Bombing of Undisclosed
The smell was microwave popcorn.
The door opened and there was Amy, her handless left arm curled around said bag of popcorn. Her eyes got huge behind her glasses and then her arms were around me and we were crushing a popcorn bag between us. She was sobbing and pressing her face into my chest so hard her glasses had gone askew. I squeezed her and ran my hand through her hair and whispered to her that it was all right, that everything was all right.
I have no idea how long we stood there like that, or how long John and Anna stood there and waited. All I could think was how much I wished, for the second time, we could just freeze a moment and run credits over it.
John said, “Sorry that took so long. I had to ramp something.”
Amy pulled away and wiped her eyes and said, “Oh my God you won’t believe what I just did. I got hungry and I used a microwave to make this and it tripped a breaker that I guess runs out to the generator and if the computers had been on that same breaker we would have lost everything.”
She gathered herself and said to John, “I never doubted you.”
John said, “Now there’s a lie. But I don’t blame you.”
I said, “Shit, I’m still doubting him.”
Amy looked down at Anna and said, “You and Mr. Bear did good. We’re all here. Even Molly’s here.”
She was. Curled up on the floor, under a desk. Holy shit did that dog get around.
“How did she—”
I was talking to Amy’s back. She was scurrying across the room to a desk where she had set up no fewer than five computer monitors and three keyboards. There was a box of donuts and a pot of coffee going. It looked like she’d been working here for a week.
Amy said, “Okay, this setup looks ridiculous but I finally figured out they had different parts of the security set up on different workstations and there was no way to monitor them all without running back and forth across the room. I had to crawl around and reroute network cables and—anyway, all of the security robots around the quarantine are offline, they’re in maintenance mode and as far as I know they can’t be reset remotely, so that should be taken care of. The UAVs, the drone things, I think they’re okay. It’s—it’d take a long time to explain but I e-mailed a guy and got that taken care of. All that is the good news. The bad news is—wait, the good news is that I know how they’re blocking the cell phone signals, it’s not done through the provider level or anything, they have a jammer somewhere, probably outside of city limits, it’s a big thing called a warlock jammer, a TRJ-89, it sits on the back of a truck. The bad news is that I can’t shut it down from here. There’s an actual crew manning it, that’s why I think it’s outside of town because REPER pulled all of their staff out beyond city limits but they’re still manning the jammer because it’s really, really important that nobody in town be able to call out until they drop the bombs.”
Amy stuffed a handful of popcorn in her mouth.
I said, “Right, they’re going to bomb the quarantine at noon.”
She shook her head so hard that her hair went slapping around her cheeks.
Around a mouthful of chewed popcorn she said, “Huh uh. They’re going to bomb the whole town.”
1 Hour Until the Aerial Bombing of Undisclosed
John said, “Even that Cuban sandwich place?”
She nodded. “An hour from now.”
I said, “Bullshit. They can’t get away with bombing an entire city. What are they gonna do, claim an asteroid fell on it?”
Amy looked surprised, and said, “David, you don’t understand what it’s been like out there, out in the real world. Everything has been just totally cut off from the town. Everything the world knows about what’s going on in [Undisclosed] is based one hundred percent on what REPER has told them. They don’t have to claim it’s anything. The whole country is begging them to do it. Here. Look. This was twenty minutes ago.”
She spun around to face one of her monitors and brought up a video clip, from one of the network news sites. It was a group of haggard-looking middle-aged men, facing a bank of microphones. And there, among them, was my shrink. Dr. Bob Tennet.
The first guy, introduced as the head of the outbreak task force, spoke and confirmed that they had in fact been given permission by the president of the United States to use military assets to “disinfect” the entirety of Outbreak Ground Zero, and that this would proceed as soon as it could be confirmed that all military and REPER personnel were clear of the area.
I pointed to Tennet standing in the back and said, “You see that guy back there, with the Caesar haircut? That’s my therapist.”
“But why would he be—”
“It was all part of the setup. He works for Them.”
“Who? Oh, you mean capital ‘T’ Them.”
John said, “He’s talking.”
On the video, Tennet strode up to the microphone, his title displayed as DR. TENNET, CONSULTANT, REPER.
* * *
“Thank you, Mr. Secretary, I’ll be brief. You’ve all come to know me over these trying days, and I’ve found myself in the unexpected position of relaying to the public the serious nature of this threat with what I hope you appreciate as frankness, honesty and transparency, while trying to ensure that caution did not turn into panic. What I have been saying from day one continues to be just as true now, if not more so: fear is the most dangerous contagious disease.
“So with that, I want to address the question a moment ago about deaths resulting from the bombardment, that is, the thermobaric disinfection of the affected area that Secretary Fernandez just explained, which will, as he said, commence at noon local time. This needs to be made perfectly clear, for you here, for those watching this on the news, and for our children and grandchildren who will try to understand this act when it passes into the pages of history books. As far as we know, there is no one left alive in the city of [Undisclosed]. As you know, the National Guard and multiple agencies including the CDC, FEMA and REPER took decisive coordinated action to create a buffer around the city, a five-mile band that we referred to as the Yellow Zone but in the news media has been unfortunately redubbed the Dead Zone. In this, we were successful, and we may never know how many lives were saved by moving rapidly and decisively to isolate the infection zone.
“However, efforts to stop the spread of the contagion, which has colloquially become known as the Zulu Parasite, within the city itself have utterly failed. The infection rate within city limits is now at or near one hundred percent. This operation is about the disposal and disinfection of tens of thousands of highly—highly—infectious corpses. Now, I have worked very hard all week to shoot down the more outlandish rumors that have spread about the parasite, and I suspect I will spend the rest of my life doing the same. That is the nature of that contagion we call paranoia. But the situation is this. Whatever residents of [Undisclosed] are still walking and moving, are, for all intents and purposes, effectively dead. We have explained this ad nauseum; the parasite completely breaks down and effectively rewires the victim’s brain tissue. The victims retain some basic motor control and become extremely, extremely violent as the parasite continues to corrupt the central nervous system. From then, until the victim is finally rendered immobile, they are highly, highly contagious. This stage of the disease is what has unfortunately led to some of the more sensationalist rumors of ‘zombies’ and the like. But I want to make it perfectly clear: these are nothing more than people who, after death, are able to remain mobile, dangerous and infectious.”
John said, “Well, that should put everybody at ease.”
I snorted.
Amy said, “I wasn’t even paying attention, all I can picture is you having sex with him.”
John said, “What?”
Tennet was still talking:
“… which is what makes the situation so exceptionally dangerous if we don’t complet
ely eliminate the threat using all means available to us. The sights and the sounds of this terrible, but necessary, process, will be shocking. This is something none of us wanted to see happen in an American city. But let me make it clear now, and for all time: we are only disposing of the dead. Nothing more. Thank you.”
John pointed at the screen and said, “You notice they even started using a ‘Z’ word to describe the parasite? Might as well have called it the ‘Zombie Virus.’”
I shook my head. “Son of a bitch. Marconi was right. That panic is just going to ripple out, like splashing a rock in a pond.”
John said, “What do we do?”
I said, “We get the hell out of town and find some other place to live. Man, I wonder if the insurance will pay for my house getting bombed…”
Amy said, “David, we can’t let them do this.”
“Babe, I don’t think there’s a choice. They set it up so that it would be the only option. If they don’t scour this town off the face of the earth, then people will never be satisfied. People will be killing each other in the streets, a new panic set off every time a normal-looking person monsters out. It’s shitty that they’ll get what they want, but … this is kind of checkmate. They kill [Undisclosed], or the world kills itself.”
John said, “‘They.’ What a bunch of assholes.”
Anna walked up beside Amy.
“Can I have some of your popcorn?”
“You can have the bag, honey. Sorry it kind of got squished.”
“It’s okay.”
Damn, that was a creepy kid.
To Amy, John said, “You’ve got working e-mail there? Can’t you send a message to the New York Times or somebody? Telling them what’s going on?”
“Oh, I did. I also found out that the news channels and all the big papers were getting over a hundred thousand messages a day from zombie cranks and apocalypse crazies and everybody else. Mine will be one more in the pile. Maybe some intern will get to it six months from now. Maybe it’ll mean something to the town they build on top of the ashes of this one.”
I said, “Damn, girl, you got cynical in the last couple of weeks.” She didn’t smile. I read something in her face and said, “Wait a second. How did you get here? Did you come in on that RV?”
She nodded. “I came down with some guys. Hipsters who thought they were going to come down and shoot zombies and have future high schools named after them.”
“They, uh, didn’t make it, did they?”
She shook her head.
“Jesus, Amy. Nobody else made it?”
She shook her head again.
I went to her and hugged her again. “How the hell did you get away?”
She couldn’t answer. Instead, she pulled away and said, “It really is perfect the way they set this up. It brought everybody’s worst fears out of the woodwork, and every little thing the government said made it just a little bit worse. It was all there, David. Under the surface. They just came along and pricked everybody’s balloon.”
I said, “Well, it doesn’t change anything. Our mission is to get the hell out of here. Then if, you know, they drop the bombs, that sucks, but all we can do is tell the world what we know.”
Amy stood up and brushed a dozen pieces of dropped popcorn off her lap.
She said, “What are we waiting for?”
I gestured toward Anna and said, “What do we do with her? We don’t have time to find—”
“Where’d she go?” John was looking around the room.
I said, “She was right he—”
The lights went out.
* * *
“Damn it! I knew she was a monster! John! Amy! Listen! Guard your buttholes.”
I heard John knocking objects off a nearby table, blindly grabbing for his shotgun.
From the pitch blackness, Amy said, “Calm down, it’s probably just the generator. It probably just ran out of gas.” She shouted, “Anna? Honey? Are you okay?”
I heard the click of a door lock.
Molly started barking.
“Somebody’s leaving! Who’s leaving? I heard the door!”
John said, “I got the shotgun. Somebody look for a flashlight.”
“Anna? Are you in here? It’s okay, honey, don’t be afraid.”
I said, “That’s right, little girl. Everything is fine. Come … get in front of John’s shotgun.”
Something long and slim and warm slid into my palm. It had bumpy ridges, like an earthworm. It slipped through my hand and around my wrist and forearm.
I yelled and yanked my hand away but the thing—the Anna thing, in its true form—held fast. It slithered around my elbow and came to rest under my armpit. Then another tentacle was wrapping around my knee. I made panicked, cursing noises and stumbled backward.
“DAVE! HEY! WHERE ARE YOU?!”
I went to the floor. There was a crash in the darkness, presumably John tripping over a chair while blindly flailing to my rescue.
Amy screamed. “DAVID!”
“IT’S GOT ME! SHE’S GOT ME!”
I kicked and thrashed and the bundle of flexing tentacles slipped around my abdomen. And then, around my neck.
I threw myself to my feet, and tried to find a wall to slam into, to crush it. I wound up flinging myself through thin air, tripping over a box.
The monster was shrieking in my ear. I pulled at the limb around my neck but it was strong, so freaking strong.
Everybody was yelling, but I could hear nothing over the screeching that was turning into an ice pick in my ear. Then, there was a crash from the room next to us, metal and glass like something big and heavy had been knocked over. Amy screamed. Molly barked.
I got to my feet once more, wearing the Anna monster like a writhing backpack. I found a wall and slammed backward into it.
It didn’t budge. Somebody was screaming my name.
I heard a door burst open.
“ANNA!”
This was a new voice, a man’s voice, with an accent.
A blast of light flooded the room. Everyone froze.
Standing in the doorway was a Latino guy who I thought looked like Marc Anthony. I knew I had seen him before but in my state of panic, couldn’t place where. He was holding a huge flashlight and he whipped it around the room, first finding Amy, who was still standing next to the dead computer and squinting at the sudden brightness. Then he spotlighted John, who was pointing his shotgun right at my face.
Then the light found me, and I felt the tentacle loosen from around my neck. The Anna thing slithered to the floor, and in the harsh shadows of the beam I saw a filthy nightgown tangled around a nightmare wad of tentacles that looked like they were made of knotted clumps of black hair. Somewhere in the center of it was a pair of eyes on either side of a sideways mouth and clicking mandibles.
The man with the flashlight said, “Anna. Are you okay?”
The tentacles started twisting and bundling together, fusing and melting and re-forming. In a few seconds, there was the little girl again. She straightened her nightgown and sniffled and started crying.
The man said again, “Are you okay?”
Anna shook her head.
“No, you’re all right.”
In the shadows I could see John looking back and forth, between me, the guy, and Anna. He was still pointing the shotgun at me, he realized, and he pointed it at the floor instead.
To me, the guy said, “Are you all right? You’re David, right?”
“She … turned into a … thing…”
“I know that. Did she hurt you?”
“The light went off and she got me around the neck…”
“Did she hurt you?”
“No.”
Anna sobbed and said, “He hurt me!”
The guy said, “Now Anna, you scared him. You turned and you scared him.”
“I didn’t mean to! The lights went out and I c-couldn’t h-help it…”
“Anna, you need to say you’re sorry to David.?
??
Anna did not agree with this.
“Anna…”
She defiantly said, “I’m sorry.”
To me, he said, “Do you accept her apology, as heartfelt as it clearly wasn’t?”
I had no words. “I … she turned into a … thing…”
Anna started crying in earnest once more. Amy said, “Hey. David.” I turned and out of the darkness, an object came hurtling toward me. I flinched, threw up my hands and squealed. A filthy, stuffed bear bounced off my gut.
I found it on the floor. Handling it like I was passing a piece of meat into a tiger cage, I kneeled and extended the bear toward Anna.
She flung herself toward me, utilizing her preternatural, little-girl speed. I had no time to react. She flew at me, and threw her arms around my neck. She pressed her wet face against mine and hugged me. She said, “I’m sorry I scared you, Walt.”
“It’s, uh, okay.” I put an arm around her, and for the tenth time in a week felt like I had become numb to the ridiculous.
Anna pried herself away from me, plucked Mr. Bear from my hands and navigated her way through the wrecked room, over to the flashlight man. He kneeled down to catch her, and gave her a kiss on the forehead.
I said, “I … don’t understand. Is she…”
“This is my daughter, Anna. She’s eight years old.”
“And you are…”
“I’m Carlos.”
50 Minutes Until the Aerial Bombing of Undisclosed
John, reading the expression on my face, said, “You two know each other?”
Carlos answered for me, saying, “We were over in quarantine together.”
I said, “And you are … you’re like her? Right?”
“No. Not like her. What I mean is, she’s not like me. She won’t hurt you. She hasn’t hurt anybody. Not like me.”
“So, you are the one who—”
“Not in front of her. But yes.”
“But you want us to believe that we’re safe. From you, I mean.”
“There is a lot about this situation that you do not understand. In quarantine, they were using you to sort the infected from uninfected, right? But you can’t really do it. Not like I can. Me, I can see them, as easy as telling man from woman. I can see it at a glance.”