“Hey, doc, before you break your arm patting yourself on the back you mind telling us what the hell you’re talking about?” I asked.
“Of course, I’m sorry. It’s the smallpox. They stopped vaccinating for it in 1972, which means you were vaccinated for it, and the other cryonics were not. Soldiers serving in Africa received it because there had been an outbreak there before the war, and I was vaccinated because I handle it here in the lab. It’s the only thing that separates the four of us from the rest of the population.”
“But why would a smallpox vaccine stop the virus?” Alex asked. “Back in New York, we determined the origin virus was JCV.”
“Good question. Apparently, the mutated virus is similar enough to smallpox that the vaccine prepares the body to defend against it. We didn’t think it was similar enough for this to happen, but by God, it works! Think of it this way. The smallpox vaccine doesn’t actually contain the smallpox virus. It uses a vaccinia virus that is similar enough to smallpox that its presence equips the body’s defenses for the real thing. That vaccine also prepares the body for this virus.”
“So it’s a cure then,” I said.
“It isn’t a cure. It’s only a vaccine, but it may be able to lessen the infection if given soon enough after exposure.”
“How soon?”
“That I don’t know. The sooner the better.”
“What about the ones wandering around outside? Can we give it to them?”
“No, there’s no curing them. They’re already dead.”
“Well, how do you explain them wandering around, attacking people, and stuff when the virus has already killed them?”
“That . . . defies explanation. It may very well be the hand of God clearing the Earth of man’s transgressions.”
38.
“This will greatly increase your chances of survival,” Dr. Trowbridge said as he pricked Alex repeatedly with the smallpox vaccine.
“If it works,” Alex pointed out.
“Indeed. If it works.”
Celeste had received the vaccine first, and was now sitting on a chair holding her shoulder. As I watched them get vaccinated, I was overcome by the incredible power of the opportunity that we’d been given. We were very likely the only people in the world who knew how to beat the disease. I thought of my wife and son back in San Diego. They needed to know about this, and I needed to see them. I needed to go home.
“You’re awful quiet over there,” Celeste coaxed.
“Just thinking, that’s all.”
“Thinking about what?”
“About what we do now.”
“What we do now? We stay here until the food runs out,” Alex chimed in. “This is a safe place. We could even build a barricade upstairs and spread out a little.”
“What about the people back home?” I wondered.
“Back home?” Celeste asked.
“You know . . . out West. The people who are free. Are we going to just let them die of this?”
“You’re making a lot of assumptions there. The entire US military is set up along the front. Nothing is going to make it past that,” Alex said.
“You said the same thing when we were in the city. The Chinese military was going to come and clear the streets any minute. Remember that?”
Alex grew quiet.
“How are they doing against the freaks so far, Alex?”
“What if I’m incorrect?” Dr. Trowbridge asked. “What if the vaccine doesn’t work?”
“Then at least we’ll know we tried. That’s a lot better than sitting here holed up like a bunch of cowards.”
“I’ll do it,” Celeste broke in solemnly.
“Do what?” Alex asked.
“I’ll be the guinea pig. Inject me with the virus, and we’ll see if the vaccine works.”
“No, Celeste! Please?” Alex begged.
“Do you know how many people we could save? Our whole country. We could save our whole country if this works.”
“And if it doesn’t?” I asked.
“Then that’s my choice. I don’t want to live like this—trapped in a basement, fearing for my life every time I step outside. This isn’t living. This is captivity. I’ve been in captivity long enough. I want to be free.”
Silence filled the room.
Never one to bite my tongue, I spoke first. “Can you do it, doc?”
“Of course, I can inject her with tainted blood, but I’m uncertain if I want this on my conscience.”
“You haven’t been outside yet, doc. You’re going to have far worse things on your conscience just trying to stay alive.”
39.
Early that evening, Dr. Trowbridge caved under the pressure. Since the smallpox virus starts working immediately, he went ahead and injected Celeste with a small vial of tainted blood. I couldn’t believe how calm she was about the whole thing. I’d never seen such courage.
She chatted with us late into the evening and then lay down to sleep. Alex, Dr. Trowbridge, and I stayed up through the night, fidgeting nervously like expectant fathers stuck in the waiting room. Celeste was an early riser, so when she didn’t wake up by nine a.m. we knew something was wrong. By ten, she was running a fever, and Dr. Trowbridge woke her up to give her fluids and draw blood.
“How you doing, kid?” I asked.
She looked me in the eye and drew me close with her index finger. “I want you to be the one to do it,” she said. “Don’t let Alex see it. He’s been through enough already.”
“I’ll do nothing of the sort.” I smiled. “You just hang in there. You’re gonna beat this.”
40.
“You gotta do something for her, doc,” I pleaded.
Dr. Trowbridge was off at his workbench running tests on Celeste’s blood. It was nearly one p.m., and her fever was growing worse by the hour. She was in a deep sleep, lying on a bed we’d brought out into the middle of the lab. Alex sat alongside her and held her hand.
“There’s nothing I can do,” he explained. “I can inject her so full of drugs that her blood will curdle, but that won’t do a thing. It’s up to her body now. Her immune system has to beat this thing.”
41.
At six p.m. Celeste was still sleeping, and Alex had retreated to the doctor’s quarters to rest. I sat next to her wondering if my selfishness had once again reared its ugly head. I wanted to save my family, sure, but the future of our country was riding on this cure as well. At least that’s what I told myself while I listened to Alex crying himself to sleep.
“I’m going to get some rest as well,” Dr. Trowbridge said. “I think it’s time we restrain her.”
“Okay, Andy. You go. I’ll take care of it.”
Dr. Trowbridge patted my neck, then turned and headed back into his sleeping quarters. Celeste looked beautiful lying there, even though her skin was pale and clammy. Her ravenesque hair and full lips were reminiscent of Snow White’s peaceful slumber. I noticed she was no longer sweating profusely, and I wondered if she’d soon be writhing in pain and moaning like the others had before they turned.
“Why did you have to be so God damned brave?” I whispered in her ear. I was angry with her, but only because I was angry with myself. “We could have made it out there—all of us. We could have gone out West and been free.”
I stood and leaned forward with my hands on the edge of the bed. I was overcome by sadness and shame. My head drooped low, and my eyes welled with tears. I felt deeply responsible for her death. I was selfish for bringing her to the hospital in the first place, and selfish for trying to persuade them to head West.
“I am so sorry,” I said, closing my eyes to fight back the tears.
That’s when I felt her hands clutch my throat. My eyes sprang open. Celeste’s teeth were clenched, and her eyes were wide and maniacal. I looked to my left and right, searching desperately for something to smash her with, but found nothing. And that’s when it hit me. Her eyes—they weren’t glazed and bloodshot like the others. They looked
normal, even human. Before I had a chance to react to this realization, her hands went limp on my collarbone, and she burst out laughing.
“Did you miss me, you big baby?” she teased.
“You are pure evil,” I said, pushing her hands off me. “I really thought you were done.”
“Awww, Mr. Funny Man doesn’t like it when the shoe’s on the other foot, does he?”
“I guess not.”
“You deserve it, and you know it.”
“I guess so. What the hell is going on with you? Are you all right?”
“How long have I been sleeping?”
“Since this morning when we last spoke.”
“Honestly, I feel pretty good now. I think I might have kicked it.”
And kicked it she had.
42.
Alex was overjoyed to have Celeste back. Dr. Trowbridge, too, though I think he was more excited about being the first person to cure the disease. Celeste regained her strength quickly, and in a couple of days, the four of us were packed and ready to go. We planned to head west and find a way to sneak across the front. If we wanted to deliver the cure and give our soldiers the upper hand, we needed to get to the US side before the plague did.
We checked out the abandoned homes in Weston. I felt like an intruder. If you ignored the dust and decay, it looked like the families might return at any moment. Breakfasts were spread out neatly on kitchen tables, and newspapers all bore the same tragic date, Thursday, March 13, 2036. Pictures hung on the wall of those who had lost their freedom. Some beds were neatly made while others looked as if the sleeping occupants had been dragged out of them.
The best thing we found inside the houses was the bedding. Sleeping in the back of the van was going to be uncomfortable with it loaded with supplies. Bottled water was also a great find, as it saved us the trouble of having to find a water source and boil it ourselves. The only other things we brought with us from the homes were flashlights, a hatchet, and a pair of binoculars.
43.
We left Weston in late morning and made it into central Kentucky just before dark. Driving around the cities was pitifully slow as the roadways were littered with the vehicles of those who had attempted to flee only to get bottlenecked by military roadblocks. Most vehicles had broken windows. The occupants’ mangled corpses lay nearby. Those who hadn’t been dragged to the pavement were splattered across the insides of their cars. Cars that had left the line of traffic were riddled with bullet holes. It was clear the Chinese knew the outbreak was coming and tried to keep people inside the city. Such an incredible waste given that the roadblocks were also overrun. Soldiers’ bodies were strewn among piles of chopped-up zombie corpses. We wondered whether the soldiers had been killed because their lasers ran out or they were overcome by a never-ending mass of fearless attackers.
We drove into the countryside well west of Louisville, and decided we wouldn’t stop until we hadn’t seen a ghoul for at least half an hour. That would leave a pretty good cushion between us and the zombies lumbering along the roadway. In the end, it didn’t matter. We hadn’t been asleep for two hours before pounding on the outside of the van woke us up. We decided to keep on driving. We drove in shifts: two slept, one drove, and the other watched for zombies and our driver falling asleep.
We approached eastern St. Louis shortly before dawn, and our surroundings changed dramatically. Abandoned towns and paved roads gave way to bombed-out military bunkers and barbed wire barriers lining the rutted dirt roads that crisscrossed the landscape. The zombies walking aimlessly outside our windows no longer included Chinese civilians and Americans. They were all Chinese soldiers.
“We better stop,” Dr. Trowbridge insisted. “We don’t want to enter the front until daylight. It’s safer that way.”
“Why?” Alex asked.
“It’ll be easier for the Chinese to capture us if we don’t know where they are.”
“How are we going to get past them?” I asked.
“I’m not certain, but we’ll find a way.”
44.
We waited until an hour after sunrise, then entered eastern St. Louis carefully. After nearly a decade of war, the city was in ruins. Most of the buildings had been toppled or gutted by explosions. Others had been reconstructed as bunkers hidden beneath the rubble. The binoculars proved essential as we scouted each section of the city’s remains before determining that it was safe to enter. The closer we moved to the river, the fewer zombies we saw.
“Where the hell are they?” I asked. “I thought you said there were millions of soldiers stationed along the river.”
“There were,” Alex replied. “I don’t know where they went. If they’ve succumbed to the disease, they sure aren’t here.”
Alex was right. There weren’t enough zombies considering the massive number of Chinese soldiers stationed in the area. Then we saw the river. Things started to make sense. Massive craters lined our side of the shoreline. Pieces of Chinese soldiers were everywhere. Yapping heads flopped about, and torsos dragged themselves along the ground. Zombies, not soldiers, had been annihilated.
“Did you notice how all of the bunkers were empty?” Dr. Trowbridge asked.
“Yes, and the vehicles, too,” Alex said.
“What do you think happened?” Celeste asked.
Dr. Trowbridge curled his hand in front of his mouth. He studied the river as if it held the answers.
“They wanted to get across,” he said.
“The freaks?” I asked.
“Exactly. When enough of them had succumbed to the disease, they didn’t have a food source on this side of the river. When they saw the soldiers on the other side, they lined the shoreline.”
“What soldiers on the other side? I don’t see anybody,” I said.
“They must have been aware of the disease. Perhaps they retreated after bombing this side. No need to monitor the front when your enemy is already dead.”
“I think you’re right about them wanting to get to the other side,” I said. “Look in the river. See that? Oh, there’s another one. And right up there, there’s three more.” I pointed at the bloated corpses twisting and turning in the river as the current dragged them downstream.
“What do you think is happening on the other side?” Celeste asked.
“I’m not certain, but we better go and have a look.”
45.
We searched several empty bunkers and found two gun chargers, a rocket launcher, and ammunition. Then we drove along the waterfront and found the hull of an old apartment building that still had the fire escape attached. We parked the van underneath the iron staircase and climbed to the top of the ladder. Dr. Trowbridge and I used the binoculars to scan the city on the other side of the river. Just like on our side, St. Louis was in ruins. Even the Gateway Arch was destroyed. All that remained were two mutilated stubs protruding from the ground. Through the binoculars, I saw groups of US soldiers roaming the streets. When I focused in closer, it was clear they’d turned.
“You see them?” I asked Dr. Trowbridge.
“Yes, I see them. Sorry, everyone, but it looks like our soldiers have succumbed to the virus as well. I don’t think we should cross here. There’s too many of them.”
As far as we could see in both directions, the massive eight-lane Poplar Street Bridge was the only bridge that still spanned the waterway. The others had been blown to bits. I could see a massive barricade in the center of the bridge and a vast horde of US soldier zombies roaming the other side.
“I don’t think we could cross here even if we wanted to. If we did make it across, we’d never make it through the city,” I suggested.
“Do you think there are other bridges intact?” Alex asked.
“There won’t be many, I know that,” Dr. Trowbridge replied.
“Um, guys, looks like we have a problem,” Celeste said, looking down at the van, which was surrounded by several dozen zombies. They groaned and held their arms in the air as if they might be able to
reach us.
“I guess we attracted them by coming up here,” I said.
“What did you expect? They can see us from half a mile away,” Alex grumbled. He started climbing down the fire escape.
“Geeze, what’s gotten into him?”
We all had our rifles, but Alex led the charge. He jumped down from the bottom rung to the van, turned on his laser, and dispatched the majority of them before Celeste could even get her laser going. Once she did, Celeste finished off the remaining ones. We followed them down and got in the van.
“Boy, you weren’t kidding about pulling your own weight, were you?” I prodded Alex. He smiled back at me and shook his head.
46.
We drove north along the eastern edge of the river, searching for a bridge to cross. We were several miles north of the city and still hadn’t found one intact when the shockwave from a massive explosion rattled the van. Alex slammed on the brakes, and we all leaped out. A massive mushroom cloud rose over the city on the other side of the river. Another explosion detonated a mile or two closer to us. The shockwave that quickly followed knocked us to the ground and blew the windows out of the van. That explosion was followed by another and another. We sat silent on the ground, watching in awe as four bulbous burnt sienna mushroom clouds crowded the sky above the city.
“The Chinese are using nukes again?” I yelped. The other three were much calmer. War was desensitizing.
“No, those are conventional weapons,” Dr. Trowbridge responded. “If they were using nukes, they wouldn’t need four bombs.”
“We would also be covered in radiation burns by now,” Alex added.
“Why are they bombing the city? Are they retaliating for getting wiped out along the river?”