The Last Virus Read online

  “If you don’t mind me asking, sir, what exactly is Tunnel X?”

  “It was here about 3 months before Sector 4 was discovered, Translator. They don’t bother us. We don’t bother them. That’s the fucking agreement. That is until they break said fucking agreement by shutting off our water, and then I have to bring my ass over there. Which is highly fucking inconvenient because I’m trying to run a war over where I’m at.”

  “Who are they?”

  “A small group of Jesus freaks led by some guy who thinks angels keep speaking to him.”

  “They’re sitting on the main shut-off valve, aren’t they?” I said.

  “Yeah, it fucking runs through there. And every time the guy has a vision, he closes it until I come down there to hear what the angels had to say to him.”

  We walked a little farther until I had one more question to ask of the general. I wanted to know why if they were just followers of Christ, did we come loaded up with enough weapons to fight a platoon of Ayla regulars.

  “Because in their goddamn version of the New Testament, Translator, Jesus seems to be not only the Son of God but also an arms dealer. They’re armed to the fucking teeth.”

  A few minutes later, we were met with the unmistakable smell of death. While there wouldn’t have been anyone there who hadn’t come upon this sickeningly sweet odor before, this was different. This was the smell of an in-progress apocalypse. This was a scent I can only imagine that the curator of hell wears to the wedding of his daughter. Everyone pushed on through, though. No one wanted to look weak in the presence of the general. That was until we walked along a little farther and came to an abrupt halt as a swarm of flies put up a wall twenty feet ahead of us. The noise was so loud that you would have had to shout to hear the person next to you. None of it impressed the general.

  “You pussy fucks better be stopping because someone was able to squeeze a goddamn Abrams M1A3 down here, and it’s got its 120 mm smoothbore pointed right at your balls.”

  “No, sir. Flies. Thousands of them.”

  “You think I’m watching a different fucking movie than you, Private.”

  “No, sir.”

  “Then keep fucking moving. They’re goddamn blowflies to be specific. Everyone’s got a right to a meal.”

  The general was correct. They were blowflies and they were dining at the most magnificent feast of their short lives. On two overhead pipes that ran on our left and right, hung the bodies of soldiers from the Caliphate. They had been stripped of their uniforms, which were neatly folded below their feet. What was odd, though, was that they weren’t hanging from their necks as one would have expected. Instead, they were held up there by some harness contraption of copper wire that ran across their chest a few turns and then was looped under their armpits. By the lack of decay, it was obvious some had just been brought to the table. Others I assumed had probably been there for a week or more. This I based not only on the extent of the decay but also on the number of maggots and carrion beetles crawling in and out of them. To keep from vomiting, I began counting bodies. I was at number fourteen on my side when I came to the last one.

  Maybe I stopped because there wasn’t a large swarm around him. Maybe I stopped out of some sick curiosity to see how he had met his fate. Most likely, though, it was because he couldn’t have been any older than fifteen years of age. I took my flashlight off of his face and moved it down his body. I didn’t have to travel very far before I saw that someone had cut perhaps a three-by-four section of skin out of his belly. There, a formation of blowflies had found his intestines a perfect perch to take rest.

  I returned the beam of light to his face and began to wonder if he really believed his life had served a higher purpose. At that moment of death, did he really believe in martyrdom, or was he wishing for just a little more time to be a kid? All those thoughts were racing around my head when his eyelids rolled open like a storefront gate. It was so horrifying that my body startled back, my feet crossed, and I hit the ground. A moment or so later I found myself being lifted up.

  “Stay in line, Translator. This isn’t a goddamn museum tour where you’re given time to ponder over the art pieces.”

  “He’s alive, sir.”

  “Which one?”

  “That one there, sir.”

  The general followed the direction I gave him and took a few steps over to the young soldier of the Caliphate. He cupped the face like a father would his son, and then gave it one quick, merciful twist.

  “There. Is that fucking better?”

  I didn’t reply.

  “I’m going to take that as a fucking yes. Now, don’t you fall back unless I give a goddamn direct order. You got that?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  The general hurried our steps until we met up with our men. Twenty meters ahead, the tunnel widened to three times its size. We were now staring at two tunnels. On the wall leading to the tunnel on the right, written in carmine lettering, the words:

  God judgeth the righteous, and God is angry with the wicked every day – Psalm 7:11

  On the wall to the left, written in the same blood red, the words:

  For whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth– Hebrews 12:6

  The general ordered the men to move into the tunnel on the right. It was twice as wide as the one we had been traversing. Instead of one set of railroad tracks, there were now two. I don’t believe we had advanced more than thirty or so meters through this new tunnel when we came to another abrupt halt. Except for the general and myself, everyone dropped to their knees, and the sound of weapons being locked and loaded echoed throughout the tunnel. They shone their lights on us, and we reciprocated. It was like two cars in the middle of nowhere facing off against each other.

  The general pushed away the men in front of him and began making his way toward the front of our line. I stayed back, sweeping my eyes over their position. In the middle, they had the barrels of two M240s set side by side peering over a toppled desk about three feet high. The flanks of the machine gun nest they had protected by slabs of concrete, five men to a side. I had a count of twelve until in the corner near the door, I saw a little girl standing there holding what I was soon to find out was a ram’s horn. It was an impressive display of force, one that made me believe if someone had accidentally fingered a trigger, we would not have been the ones to survive the ensuing firefight.

  “Tell him I’m here.”

  One of their soldiers glanced down at the little girl and gave her a nod of his head. Like the rest of them, dressed in a single white robe that was belted by a rope, she put one end of the ram’s horn to her lips and blew out a series of notes. A few seconds later, it was answered by the sound of another ram’s horn on the other side. The door was then opened, and we were invited in.

  We filed into what I assumed was the welcoming room. It was illuminated in candlelight and heavily perfumed with the scent of cloves. There were skulls on the floor, and there were skulls set into small alcoves. It could have been hell’s anteroom, or it could have been heaven’s waiting area. A ram’s horn blew again. Through the back came in two identical women with long cinnamon-colored hair falling past their waists. They couldn’t have been any older than twenty-five years of age. They couldn’t have been any less than six feet tall. Both had a book in their hands. They spoke in unison. They both said, “Choose.” The general obliged them, and set his hand down hard on the book on his right.

  “The Good Book has been chosen,” they both then said. For the fourth time, the ram’s horn sounded.

  Six feet six. Maybe an inch over that. He was bearded. One eye patched with gauze, and like all of them, was wearing nothing but a white robe belted in rope. He gave all of us a look before setting his right eye on the general, who was starting to speak.

  “Gotta fucking say, I love what you’ve done to the exterior since I last visited. You’re going to have to give me the name of your landscaper. He does great work.”


  “Their deaths were ordained. But they are the last. There shall be no more.”

  “Yeah, well, I sure as hell hope not. Because you were taking one big motherfucking risk by hauling those Caliphate soldiers down here. We all live on the same goddamn block if you haven’t noticed. They find you, that means they find me. Now, if you don’t mind, I’d like to get to the reason why you shut off our water again. Because it’s not only me now who wants to put a few bullets into you. There are others in my sector who are questioning why we keep putting up with this bullshit.”

  “Hark, before me the great Moses, the mighty warrior. By his people sent. And his people say, ‘And wherefore have ye made us to come up out of Egypt, to bring us in unto this evil place? It is no place of seed, or of figs, or of vines, or of pomegranates; neither is there any water to drink.’ ”

  “And Moses said, ‘I’m not sure about the fucking figs and pomegranates, but the reason we have no water is that some asshole over in the tunnels next to us keeps shutting it off.’ So, let’s get on with it. What the hell did the angels tell you this time?”

  “Last night, General, my name was Caleb and I was walking through the ruins of your sector searching for survivors. From those of the dead who wrote of their lives, I began collecting the pages they had written upon. Praise be to God.”

  On their side, they all answered, “Praise be to God.”

  “And last night while I was dreaming, I was sixteen and giving the high hard one to Lori Maggiano in the back of my Camaro.”

  “There is more, General.”

  “Please. Go on. Your show.”

  “Before I collected the writings of those in your sector, I came upon a grand room of like no other I had seen. Inside I found a man naked and inverted on a cross. The skin of the body was unbruised and untainted, but the face was blackened by flames. I neared, and there on the ground before him, was the uniform he once proudly wore and the weapon he once wielded. And just as I was about to say a prayer to deliver his soul to heaven, I came to realize that they had torched him alive.”

  “And just how the fuck do you know they did it while he was still breathing?”

  “Because General, you spoke to me at that moment and said, ‘Kill ‘em all.’ Your last words, General. The final ones before I picked up your weapon and ended your life.”

  “That’s it. That’s the reason you shut off our water this time? To tell me I was going to die? Fuck, we’re all going to die. You, me, and even that little girl with her ram’s horn. No one’s getting out of here alive.”

  “Yes, General, what you speak is true. But those of us in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive, we who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will always be with the Lord.”

  “Well, if I were you, I would remember to bring a parachute. You may just want to come back down because it could be that His heaven is worse than his earth. Now turn on our goddamn water, or I’m going to separate your hands from your body and crank that valve with both of them.”

  The general made a start for the exit and was at the door when two of their men stepped in front of it to block his advance. Slowly, he turned around.

  “Do you really want me to fucking shoot them?”

  “There is one more thing. In the vision, I saw the girl and her child hiding in the remains. They were the only ones who survived. This I know and now you. She was wearing this though. It must be placed around her neck, for she is the deliverer.”

  He then produced a crucifix and laid it in the open palms of the little girl by his side. She walked it over to the general. The general gave her a glance before setting his eyes back on the man.

  “And what if I don’t take it and put it around her neck?”

  “Then she and her child will die, as all men die.”

  “You’re out of your fucking mind. Someone here needs to tell you that before you get them all killed.”

  For the first half mile or so back to the command center, the general remained silent, uncharacteristically so. I was wondering if the prophecy had found its way into his thoughts. Everything the man had said at first seemed like it could have been easily conjured up. An ending like that was not so implausible. The command center would one day be overrun. And most likely, it would be where the general made his last stand. That we all could have prophesized. What did seem though as if it arrived from the future was when the general was told his last words would be “Kill ‘em all.” That was the one that made all of the hairs on our bodies stand up and give more than a little credence to the tale.

  “Right on fucking schedule,” the general said as the pipe supports began to rattle, and water started to flow through them once again.

  I certainly wasn’t going to ask the general if he believed in any of what had been foretold. But I did have a few questions that I thought I could ask. Since I was unable to get a good look at the two books that the two identical women were holding, I wanted to know what they were and why he choose the book on the right.

  “One was the Bible, Translator. And the other was the Koran. They present them to me every goddamn time I come.”

  “Which one did you choose?” I asked.

  “Which fucking one would you choose?”

  “The Bible,” I said.

  “Christ, you’re about ready to take over the command, aren’t you?”

  “What do you think would happen if you chose the Koran, sir?”

  “Well, I really don’t fucking know, Translator. But if you’re so goddamn curious, the next time we have to drag our ass back over here, I’ll let you be the spokesperson so all of us can find out exactly what the hell happens when one chooses the Koran in a heavily armed den of Jesus freaks.”

  ✽ ✽ ✽

  I sat in my quarters late that night. There were new stacks of papers to be translated, but I was unable to set my mind on them. Instead, I was trying to pry the medieval-looking crucifix open without damaging it. Yes, trying to pry it open because it was also a locket. A locket that was hinged at Christ’s right arm. It was the most unusual piece I had ever seen. And then, after abandoning my attempt to open it, I just sat there and turned it over and over again, wondering if it was real or a reproduction. In the end, I concluded that it must be a fake. I threaded a piece of thin leather rope through the loop at the top so it could be delivered and placed.

  Yes, I was the last one to leave Tunnel X. Yes, I relieved the little girl of the crucifix and hurried it into my front pocket. At 4:14 a.m., I stood up and left. At 4:33 a.m., I stepped into the quarters of the girl and the prostitute. The girl was alone on a mat. She was curled in a fetal position, quite in the arms of Morpheus. I placed the crucifix around her neck. She did not stir. I was just getting up from my knees when I realized that I had not seen the prostitute. So, I aimed my flashlight to the far end of the wall and then switched it on. I only had to move the light a few feet when I saw her sitting there. She was not alone. She had her red dress unbuttoned and latched onto one of her breasts an infant. We said nothing to each other, neither in our voices nor in our eyes.

  Entry #4

  The war finally came to an end. The reigning rule of Ayla prevailed, and much to our dismay, it did not lessen their strength. In fact, in the end, their numbers within the city only increased as reinforcements arrived for their last and decisive battle. That was three weeks ago, and as I write again, we are no better positioned than we were when it began. I now realize that this is my eternal tomb. It is no longer a question of whether I will die here. It is just the questions of how and when I will die here. I would like to put down that I am resolved to this fate. But I am not. I want to live, and I want to believe in a God who will intervene and swoop down from above like a deus ex machina. It is a foolish belief though. Not unlike the belief I held onto when I was twelve that my father would not die of pancreatic cancer. The general was right. Our God loves a good fight, and unfortunately, I have come to the same con
clusion that we are all just props on his battlefield.

  ✽ ✽ ✽

  I was with the general late into the night. With us was Gunnery Sergeant Muncie. He was inventorying munitions and weapons. I was working on forging identity documents. The general was sitting on a stool looking at the map of Ayla and studying troop positions of the Caliphate. The door opened and a soldier walked in with a woman. She was dressed in a black abaya. In her left hand, it appeared as if she was holding a niqab. She looked no older than thirty years of age. The general briefly lifted his head and nodded to the soldier who had brought her to us. The soldier saluted and then departed. A minute or so later the general finally looked back up from the map and addressed her.

  “You may speak, Lance Corporal Myers.”

  “Thank you, sir. My post spotted a mini school bus pulling up to a warehouse in the Ghadir Khumm area earlier this evening.”

  “Go ahead,” the general said as he lifted a hand to his face and began feeling his fingers over the day-old growth.

  “It was full of kids, sir. Both girls and boys. By their prison uniforms, from the Bihiima labor camp.”

  “How many?”

  “We counted sixteen children, sir.”

  “I didn’t mean how many kids, Lance Corporal. I know how many goddamn seats are on a short bus. Christ, I rode one for four years when I was on the wrestling team. I mean how many armed fucking towlies were escorting them?”

  “Seven, sir.”

  “Now I’m just wondering, Lance Corporal Myers, since you’re a soldier and not a fucking photojournalist, why in the hell didn’t you just say ‘Seven dead towlies, sir?’ ”

  “They were guarding them pretty close, sir. We most likely would have shot a few of the children.”

  “So instead, you thought it better to just do nothing and return here to file a report?”

  “We can go back, sir.”

  “Go back and do fucking what? How in the hell do you think you’re going to free those kids now that they’ve all been taken inside?”