part0018

The awning was only half successful in keeping his body dry. The howling wind sprayed rain against his right side. He shifted the satchel slung over his left shoulder as he stared down the street. His bus idled in traffic only a hundred feet away.

He could walk the short distance to the bus. It would get him out of the rain, and he could tell by the way the windows fogged up that the heaters were blasting at full strength. If I were normal , Griffin bitterly thought, that is exactly what I would do . Not being normal, he refused. He knew that the entire trip to O’Hare would smell like a slaughterhouse in the middle of July.

Griffin held his hands close to his face, inspecting them for any out-of-place details. The wind, rain, and chilly temperatures had caused red splotches to cover his otherwise healthy pink skin. Satisfied, he shoved his hands back in his jacket pockets.

A Hummer creeped by slowly, maneuvering around a pothole. He shifted his attention to the decaying corpse behind the wheel, skin and hair burned from its body. The corpse sneezed, blowing blood against the windshield. Despite the grotesqueness, Griffin smirked. It served the bastard right for having one of those monstrosities in the city. Traffic was bad enough without some asshole driving a tank on rubber wheels.

He looked toward the downtown Chicago skyline, barely visible through the rain, fog, and general gloom of the day. He wished that it were beautiful and sunny, so he could have a better last look.

The grating sound of metal scraping metal filled the air as the bus stopped in front of the porn shop. The doors opened with a hiss, revealing a burned, bloodied corpse in the driver’s seat. A large chunk was missing from its head, where it looked like a bullet had entered. Griffin could not decide what disgusted him more–the stench of decay that flowed from the bus, or the sight of the cockroach burrowing into the hole in the driver’s head.

The corpse stared at Griffin for what seemed an eternity before finally yelling, “I ain’t got all day! You gettin’ on?”

Griffin covered his mouth and nose with his jacket and climbed aboard.

While the ride had been fairly smooth, Griffin received several odd stares as he held his jacket over his face and occasionally retched. An ironic fact that he bitterly acknowledged also held some humor. Over the last week, Griffin had learned to deal with the absurdity of the situation. In a strange way, he was glad the bus ride was so unpleasant. It only strengthened his resolve to board a plane and fly far from the Northern Hemisphere.

The bus pulled to a stop at the Logan Square ‘L’ Station. Griffin let everyone else get off first. He didn’t want to run the risk of bumping into anyone and having clumps of their decaying tissue stick to his clothes. He had already been through that less-than-pleasant experience on an elevator earlier in the week, ruining one of his favorite shirts.

“You gettin’ off?” The bus driver’s voice hissed through his permanently bared teeth. The effect gave it a lisp causing the words to whistle. Griffin guessed that a scavenger would gnaw off the driver’s lips after its death.

A woman yelled, “What’s your problem, asshole?” Griffin couldn’t find the source, no matter which way he turned. “Don’t give me that blind bullshit. You were staring at my tits.”

The voice had come from the shadow. Griffin wasn’t necessarily surprised to find the shadow speaking; he had encountered several situations that were less than normal in the past week. He was surprised that he still had the ability to be surprised. He looked away from the shadow, focusing all his attention out the window.

“Yeah,” she said. “You better look away. You wanna stare at some tits so badly, why dontcha grow a pair of your own?”

Despite the situation, Griffin found himself smiling at the absurdity. The shadowy girl had a sexy voice. He knew that his grin would only infuriate her more, so he kept his eyes glued to the window. He used the soft reflection the window provided to inspect his face. He was still fine.

Energetic corpses in several different levels of decomposition surrounded him. They chattered excitedly with each other about their vacations of booze in the sun, partying, and the promise of drunken sex. Sprinkled amongst the crowd were a few normal-looking people. Just like Griffin, they were going to survive the blast.

The charred woman behind the check-in desk said, “I need to see a government-issued I.D.”

Griffin didn’t care for her tone in the least. It fell somewhere between snotty and condescending. He handed her his passport and waited as she looked from his picture to his ashen face.

“Are you ill, sir?”

It was obvious she didn’t care, but he guessed it was policy.

“I’m fine. I had an allergy attack on the L, but I took some Benadryl.”

The charred woman clicked her tongue, spraying a small dusting of ash from her mouth.

“How many bags are you checking today?”

“None, I just have a carry-on.”

He couldn’t quite tell for sure through the burned facial tissue, but it looked like she raised an eyebrow.

“You’re flying all the way to Buenos Aires and you don’t need to check any bags?”

Griffin tightened with panic. He should have thought of the suspicion this would raise. He did his best not to let his face fall into that guilty expression he had whenever he was caught in a lie, but the corners of his mouth turned down while his right eyebrow rose involuntarily. He hurriedly put together the best lie he could think of.

“I’m visiting my friend, Pablo…and, uh, he’s gonna take me camping. So, he told me not to bring a lot of clothes or anything, because he said the weather’s really unpredictable. We’re just gonna stop at an outfitter to get what gear and clothing we need for the…uh, camping.”

She said nothing as she typed on her keyboard, then reached under her computer terminal and handed him a boarding pass.

“Gate C-10. Have a nice flight.”

He’d never felt as much love for a soon-to-be dead woman as he felt for her at that exact moment. Though her tone had been disingenuous, those words were the sweetest Griffin had ever heard. Now all he had to do was get through security without looking like a threat and he would be home free. For the first time in two weeks, Griffin started to feel a sense of optimism swelling in the back of his mind.

While he stood in line to get through security, he inspected his hands again. They were still fine, but he spotted an annoying hangnail on his left pinky. Staring at the red irritation seemed to make it even more uncomfortable. He bit at it helplessly, knowing he looked ridiculous, but he didn’t care. Besides, the line was moving so slowly, it wasn’t like he had anything else to do.

“Dude, they’re just flip-flops,” a stoned-sounding frat boy groaned from the front of the line. Griffin craned his neck to watch the commotion.

A student wearing a bright orange shirt and khaki shorts tried to walk through the metal detector without removing his flip-flops. A female security official wearing an unflattering polyester pantsuit grabbed him by the arm. Her expression was all Griffin needed to know that she didn’t appreciate being called “dude.” The student took one look at her face and put his flip-flops through the X-ray machine.

Griffin dropped his knapsack and tennis shoes onto the conveyor belt and watched as they disappeared into the X-ray machine. He waited impatiently, tapping his fingers against his thigh while a badly burned man kept setting off the metal detector. As if it were some sort of comedy routine, the old man passed through just to return and find another metallic object in one of his pockets.

“Try takin’ off your belt,” the security official said, pointing a bony finger at the man’s waist.

“Oh, yeah. I’ll bet that’s it,” came his chipper response. As soon as he took his belt off, the old man ran his thumbs along his waist. The polyester had melted against his skin. Griffin gagged as the old man’s thumbs made a circuit around his waistband. The skin tore free and clung to his pants like melted cheese pulled from a pizza.

Some of the more obnoxious college kids in the line let out a sarcastic cheer as the old man finally made it through the metal detector. Apparently not catching the insincerity of the gesture, the old man turned and waved.

The line moved quickly once the old man was through, and when Griffin finally strolled through the checkpoint, he silently said a thankful prayer. He grabbed his shoes and knapsack from the conveyor belt.

“Ten-four,” a deep, male voice said from behind him.

Two huge men in matching dark suits approached Griffin while he slipped a shoe on, balancing on one foot. Both were of the charbroiled variety and carried themselves as though they were ready to spring into action. The one on the left, the larger one, held a walkie-talkie. With a few long strides, they took up positions on either side of Griffin.

“Excuse me, sir,” said the large one through a crooked mouth. The right side of his jaw had been fused shut. “Could you please step this way?”

Griffin immediately checked his hands. They still looked fine, and he breathed a sigh of relief. This was going to be nothing more than a minor nuisance and then he’d be on his way.

Griffin asked as innocently as he could, “Is there a problem?”

“There’s no problem, sir. We just want to ask you some questions.”

Griffin glanced at the second man, wondering why he remained silent. The man had no mouth from which to talk, his face a solid mass of blackened tissue. Any distinguishing features had been twisted and melted into chaos.

“I’m sorry, I don’t mean to be rude,” Griffin poured honey across his voice as he talked, “but who are you?”

An I.D. badge appeared in the man’s skeletal hand as though it had been spring-loaded up his sleeve. “Agent Nicholls, Department of Homeland Security.”

A word sprang from Griffin’s brain and passed his lips before he had a chance to stifle it: “Shit.”

He made no fuss as the men ushered him toward an unmarked door next to the metal detectors. He wanted to be cooperative and to show that he posed no threat.

The room was no bigger than a walk-in closet. A small folding table sat in the center with three chairs. Two chairs on one side, the third on the other. Fluorescent bulbs cast a sickly, yellowish pall over everything.

The pallor gave Griffin a bit of a fright as he glanced at his hands again. His skin appeared jaundiced. Radiation poisoning loomed in his mind before he realized it was simply the lighting.

“Why do you keep doing that?” Agent Nicholls asked as he sat in one of the two chairs.

Griffin stared between the two men. “What do you mean? Doing what?”

“You keep looking at your hands. Is there something wrong with them?”

“No. It’s just a habit.”

“Are you high?”

“What? No!” Despite the situation, Griffin laughed. He had gone totally sober after the visions began.

Agent Nicholls nodded at the silent agent who left the room. “So, if I were to take a blood or urine sample, you’d pass with flying colors?”

Griffin tried to cover his rising panic with annoyance and sarcasm, saying, “Yes, I would pass because I’m not doing drugs.”

Nicholls’ face dropped. “You listen here, young man! This is serious business, so you better start taking it seriously.”

“Are you kidding me?” Griffin asked. “That’s a nice speech, and I’m sure it scares the hell out of your kids, but I don’t even know what’s going on here. You drag me into a room and start asking me if I’m on drugs with no reason at all. I’m taking this seriously, because if I screw around in here any longer, I’m gonna miss my flight!”

He leaned against the wall by the door and wondered if he had lost his mind.

Nicholls smiled. “And why is it so important that you catch your flight?”

“Um, because I paid a lot of money for the ticket?” Griffin asked before backtracking on his sarcasm. “Look, I’m sorry. I don’t mean to be a jerk. I have a lot of plans already set up in Buenos Aires and if I miss my flight, that’s going to throw a monkey wrench into a lot of other people’s plans.”

Nicholls leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms. He seemed to enjoy watching Griffin grovel. “Buenos Aires, huh? You ever been to Chile before?”

“No, it’ll be my first time.”

“That’ll be a hell of a trick if you can pull that off. Buenos Aires is in Argentina, not Chile.”

Griffin stared at his hands as he racked his mind for something to say. “So I suck at geography. Is that a crime now?”

“No, but lying to a federal agent is.”

“I haven’t lied about anything! Tell me one thing that I’ve lied about!”

“I don’t know yet, but I know a liar when I see one. I also know a dangerous man when I see one. So, you can understand why I can’t let you get on that plane.”

“No! No, I can’t!” Other than acting a little stranger than your common schizophrenic homeless person, he had done nothing to make himself appear as a threat.

The door opened and the silent agent returned, a charred woman following. Griffin recognized her from the check-in counter and groaned. He checked his hands. Still in the clear.

The woman gave off no hint of an unusual situation. She had probably done this dozens of times.

Agent Nicholls smiled at the woman. “Why don’t you tell me what Mr. Stewart said that caused you to suspect he might be some kind of threat?”

“When I asked how many bags he was checking, he said, ‘None, I just have a carry-on.’ When I asked him about going all the way to Buenos Aires without any luggage, he said, ‘I’m visiting my friend, Pablo…and, uh, he’s gonna take me camping. So, he told me not to bring a lot of clothes or anything because he said the weather’s really unpredictable. We’re just gonna stop at an outfitter to get what gear and clothing we need for the…uh, camping.’”

Griffin stared at her, awestruck. Despite the bored monotone of her voice, she had repeated his every word. She had even paused in all the right spots and dropped in the appropriate “uhs.”

“Do you have a fucking stenographer in your head?” Griffin asked.

She looked at Agent Nicholls and asked, “Is that all you need?”

“Yes, that will be fine. Thank you.”

The woman left, followed by the silent agent who closed the door behind them. Griffin turned to Nicholls. The smirk on the corpse’s face only made Griffin more irritable, and he instantly regretted letting the man see him look so flustered.

Nicholls kicked the other chair from under the table. It was obviously a practiced move because the chair slid to a rest giving Griffin the exact amount of room he needed. “Take a seat, Mr. Stewart.”

Griffin reluctantly sat down.

“So now you know why we’re here,” Nicholls said with a triumphant lilt.

“No, I don’t. So I sounded like an idiot when I was talking to the check-in lady. Big deal. I didn’t expect to get a game of Twenty Questions thrown at me. I mean, if I were a terrorist–”

“Who said anything about terrorists?”

“I’m assuming that’s why I’m sitting here while my plane is probably boarding.”

“I never said anything about terrorists. In fact, the only person who’s mentioned anything about terrorism is you.”

“I’m not a threat! Can’t you see that? Look at me! I’m 160 pounds soaking wet! I have nothing on me that could hurt anyone! I just want to get on the plane and get the hell out of here!”

Nicholls leaned forward. “Why’s it so important for you to fly out of here? Why are you acting like you have something to hide?”

“I’m not hiding anything, okay? It’s just important that I get on that plane. That’s the only way I can explain it that sounds sane. I’m telling you, I’m not a threat.”

“Oh, I don’t think you’re a threat. I think you know about something that’s gonna happen. And if I let you get on the plane, I’ll never find out what it is.”

Griffin stared at the agent’s blackened face and knew that he couldn’t reason his way out of this. The man had an idea in his head, the wrong idea, and it was going to cost Griffin his life. He stared at his hands.

“What’s with the hands? Tell me that.”

“Nothing,” Griffin replied, still staring at them as if spellbound. “There’s nothing wrong with them. I’m still okay.”

“What’s that supposed to mean? ‘You’re still ok’–oh, Christ! You’re carrying something, aren’t you?” Nicholls stood up and slowly backed toward the far corner of the room. He stared at Griffin, eyes bulging from their fried sockets. “Am I already infected?”

“I check my hands to make sure that I’m gonna be okay! That I survive it! So far, I do, and I wanna keep it that way!”

Nicholls’ body slumped forward, as though a huge weight straddled his shoulders. Griffin could see in the man’s distant stare that the agent had mentally checked out.

Griffin checked his watch and figured he had ten minutes to get to his terminal and catch his plane. He could make it if he ran and nobody else got in his way.

Despite his frantic state of mind, it occurred to Griffin that even if he could board the plane, they would never let it take off. An air marshal would drag him off like a criminal, no matter how much he claimed to be the victim, but his gut told him to just walk out the door and make a run for his plane.

Griffin grabbed his knapsack, slung it over his shoulder, and ran from the room.

The airport buzzed along. The silent agent was nowhere to be seen. Nobody paid Griffin any attention as he slipped into the crowd.

Griffin passed under a sign that read: ‘Gates C-1 – C-14’ and he followed the arrow. He quickened his pace to a trot and checked his watch before he slammed straight into what felt like a cinderblock wall. Griffin fell and gawked stupidly up at the silent agent. Chunks of chocolate and peanuts were smashed against the area where a mouth should have been. The agent’s big, meaty hand squeezed the life out of a Baby Ruth candy bar.

The silent agent, apparently shocked, made no move to restrain him.

Griffin kicked against the man’s knees, managing to topple the giant. He scrambled to his feet and ran to the nearest door. The agent emitted a deep, moaning noise. Griffin turned and saw him pointing and running in his direction. He pushed through a door and turned the deadbolt.

The smell of urine and disinfectant filled the air. A bathroom. No windows, no back doors, no escape.

A toilet flushed, and a man that looked straight out of a disco circa 1977 exited the stall. He was a survivor. A cheap, black toupee perched atop his head, though it didn’t match the grey hair poking out the sides and back of his scalp. His white suit jacket clashed with brown corduroys and black shoes. Three gold chains lay against his over-tanned chest.

Disco Man washed his hands, smiling wide and inspecting his nicotine-stained teeth in the mirror. A sudden pounding against the door made him turn. His face lighted in a recognition that caught Griffin off guard.

“You’re a survivor!” Disco Man said in a sincerely delighted tone. “Wow, man! Look at you. No burns, no radiation poisoning, no missing limbs. Let me tell you something, you are one lucky bastard. Most of these other people out there…food for the roaches.”

Griffin’s mouth hung open. He tried to think of something to say, but nothing seemed adequate.

“I’m going to Rio to ride this thing out,” Disco Man continued. “Then maybe catch a ship to South Africa. I’ve got a buddy in Johannesburg that has the hook-up with all the lovely local ladies. Where’re you headed?”

“Buenos Aires,” Griffin muttered.

“Great city, man. That’s a great idea on your end. Listen, I hate to be rude but I gotta catch a flight. Um, that pounding on the door, is that because of you?”

Griffin nodded.

“See, that might make it a little difficult for me to just waltz on out of here.” Disco Man’s smile fell and his voice faded as he stared at Griffin’s chest. “You, uh, got something on your shirt.”

Still in a daze, Griffin walked to the mirror.

Disco Man shook his head. “Sorry, man. That’s pretty rough.”

Griffin slowly nodded. He wished his mind would cooperate, so he could respond to Disco Man’s understatement. Not surprisingly, he was unable to spare any part of his brain for language. It was too busy processing the three bloody bullet holes that had appeared in his shirt.

He wanted to scream, to cry, to rail against the world about how unfair it was. But instead he just stared at his bloody reflection. His face had become waxy. His yellow, shiny arms reflected the light in the room like a highly polished car. He would be dead and buried before the blast, his body embalmed and preserved better than all the walking corpses he had encountered.

“Look at it this way, my man. It’s a better way to go than the alternative.”

Griffin hated the Disco Man for even thinking that, let alone saying it out loud.

The sound of the deadbolt turning caused Disco Man to jump backward and cower in a stall. Griffin faced the door, determined to make a run straight at whoever was the first through.

The door inched open, frustrating Griffin. He wanted to get it over with. Suddenly, the door flew the rest of the way open, banging against the wall. The silent agent rushed through the entry and grabbed Griffin before he could react. He slammed Griffin to the floor, pressing his face into the dirty tile under the urinals. It disgusted Griffin to think he was going to die with piss on his face. The cuffs clipped around his wrists in short order, far tighter than they needed to be. The agent pulled Griffin to his feet and marched him out of the bathroom, past a crowd of gawking corpses.

Griffin squinted against the lighting that seemed too bright. He turned his face away from the large windows that looked upon the tarmac and saw Nicholls. His crusty face was the picture of madness. He screamed something that Griffin could not entirely catch. As he charged closer, Griffin was able to understand a single word: “Carrier!”

The silent agent marched Griffin directly at the screaming Nicholls who kept repeating the word over and over, “Carrier! Carrier! Carrier!”

Nicholls reached inside his jacket and withdrew his pistol. The silent agent moaned something at Nicholls that Griffin could not understand. He tugged back on Griffin’s arm, pulling him away from Nicholls. Griffin dug the heels of his shoes into the tile and fell backward. He sat upright and turned his body toward Nicholls, purposely giving him as wide of a target as possible.

The first bullet ripped into his left lung, just below his heart. The second slammed into his stomach, passing through his right kidney and exiting his lower back. The third went straight through his diaphragm and lodged in his spine, instantly paralyzing him from the waist down.

Griffin’s body collapsed, his head resting in a sticky pool of blood that rapidly expanded. He heard screams and crying as corpses stepped back from the puddle. He barely felt the silent agent’s hands applying pressure to his wounds. His surroundings grew blurry. The last thing he saw before the light dimmed completely was the triumphant eyes of Nicholls staring down at him.

Griffin left a smile frozen on his face. •