Authors: Mainak Dhar
Less than two kilometers away, Mayukh's mother was struggling to start the car, dropping the keys again because of her badly shaking hands. Mayukh saw that his mother was on the verge of a breakdown, and took hold of her hands.
'Mom, let me drive.'
She handed over the keys without any protest. His mother had believed that they would be safe in their government colony, with the armed guards who normally did duty outside. However, by evening, it was clear that she had been badly mistaken. When Mayukh had gone out at about four to see what was happening outside, he saw that all but one of the guards had left their posts. The remaining man had shrugged at Mayukh.
'They all have families. I can't blame them for wanting to get home before Sunset.'
The TV channels had reported that as the Sun slowly set over Asia, the darkness took hold over one country after another. The pattern was the same. As soon as the Sun set those who had been infected transformed into bloodthirsty creatures who savaged anyone in sight.
Mayukh inserted the keys and they left the colony. They had packed their car with as many provisions as they could, and Mayukh had the loaded handgun next to him. His father had called earlier in the day saying that if their colony did not appear safe then they were to try and get to the old Kotla stadium, which was being heavily fortified as a safe haven. Mayukh's mother had waited till the last moment, perhaps too long, to decide that they were better off trying to reach the stadium instead of staying at home. The Sun was about to set and Mayukh turned to look at his mother. He had often hated her for her nagging, but now he saw that she was looking to him to lead the way. Seeing his mother so vulnerable scared him more than anything else, reminding him that things were well and truly out of control now.
Mayukh was jolted back to reality by the repeated staccato sound of guns firing nearby.
'Mom, the firing seems to be coming from the police station. We can't go that way any more. Let's try and find another route.'
His mother just nodded.
While he did find another road, it meant he had to drive through a narrow road crammed with houses and narrow alleys on either side. That was why he never saw the three men who ran into their car. His mother screamed as the window on her side shattered and a yellow, bloodied arm reached in. Mayukh slammed his foot on the accelerator and their attackers were left behind as their car shot ahead. Another infected man came right in front of his car and Mayukh made the mistake of trying to swerve out of the way. The car hit a small shop on the sidewalk and Mayukh was temporarily winded as his head hit the steering wheel. He could hear his mother shouting.
'Hurry up, they're coming!'
Mayukh reversed the car, feeling the thump of an impact as he hit someone or something, and then resumed down the road. There were now people running all over the street, many of them pursued by screaming attackers.
A group of five infected men emerged from the shadows to their left and Mayukh turned the car into a gut-wrenching turn and sped into one of the alleys to his right. As he exited the alley on the main road, just a hundred meters to the right, attackers were beginning to break down the front door of Hina Rahman's house.
***
David came out of the Osprey, his rifle at the ready. In the fading light, he tried to make out if anyone was there at the airfield, but it seemed deserted. On their way in, the young pilot had tried to make contact with the Indian Air Force base at Hindon, just outside Delhi and also the International Airport. But both had been closed to all traffic, in anticipation of the chaos that was to unfold at Sunset. Instead, he had been advised to put down at the Safdarjung airstrip in central Delhi, which was used for microlights and gliders of flying clubs. With the ability to land vertically, the Osprey had no issue putting down. But now, David and the pilot, whose name he hadn't even asked, had to somehow make their way to the US Embassy. David wondered if that would provide any real safety, but it was better than taking one's chances on the streets.
'Kid, what's your name?'
'Stan.' The pilot looked pale and his hands were shaking.
'Get your handgun. Have you ever been in combat before?'
The pilot shook his head, and David wondered why he of all people had to babysit this kid.
'Look, just stay close and you'll be fine. When I ask you to shoot at someone, do it and aim for the head. Got it?'
Stan nodded, his eyes widening at the prospect of having to come close enough to one of the infected attackers to have to shoot him or her in the head. The streets of the Indian capital were in a state of complete chaos, clogged with cars and people who were trying to get to safety. David looked at his GPS. The US embassy was about ten kilometers away. In a straight line and without having to worry about being attacked by crazed mobs, he would have made it there in less than an hour and a half. But now, they would have to trek through a hostile landscape in the dark. They had been walking for no more than ten minutes when they saw the first evidence of the carnage around them. Cars were scattered across the road and people were running in a state of panic. David saw the cause for their panic when he spotted a group of a dozen or more of the infected walk into view. The streetlights were still on, so he could see the attack unfold clearly. They split into pairs and then attacked their chosen prey, one bringing the target down with a tackle to the leg or waist, and the other then coming in for the bite, usually to the shoulders or neck.
David watched, a bit stunned by what he saw. The black-turbaned wraiths he saw were not just mindless zombies, they were actually using some sort of tactics and thinking, even if that intelligence was as of now no more than what a pack of wild animals would have demonstrated. What he saw next was even worse. The victims seemed to lie lifeless for a few minutes, and then they got up, transformed into the same kind of creatures who had attacked them.
'Sir, let's get out of here!'
David realized that they had probably stayed too long, and then began to walk away when a young man ran up to him.
'Sir, please help us!'
The man looked like he had been trying to get home from office, and was wearing a tie and carrying a laptop bag.
This was not David's fight. He wanted to get to the Embassy and then somehow get back to the United States, so he began to turn away.
'Wait! You're soldiers, you're armed. Please do something!'
David would have kept going had he not been nearly deafened by the sound of a gun going off inches from his head.
'Shit! Stan, what in God's name are you doing?'
David watched as an attacker approaching the young man from behind was hit in the head and keeled over. Stan was standing with his gun in hand, and as another attacker approached, he fired twice, one of the bullets striking the young woman in the head. By now he had attracted the attention of the other creatures and all of them began approaching them, clambering over the cars that stood between them.
Now, whether he liked it or not, David was in the fight. He selected single-fire on his M4 and brought it up to his eyes. Three carefully aimed pulls on the trigger, three head shots. Their attackers had now stopped, standing in a state of apparent confusion, seemingly surprised at this sudden resistance. That gave enough time for the other people there to run. David looked at Stan and saw a transformed man. Gone was the nervous rookie. Stan was standing straight, holding his gun in both hands, screaming at their attackers to come on. He had often seen battle and stress bring out both the best and the worst in people. It seemed inside Stan there was a brave soldier, after all. The problem was that his bravery was likely to get them both killed. Stan gasped when the ones he had shot in the head got up after a few minutes, looking even more terrifying with the bleeding bullet holes in their heads. A young woman, or rather something that had once been a young woman, dressed in jeans and a bright red t-shirt, leaped over a car and ran straight at Stan, screaming. Stan was too shocked to react, but David put two rounds in her body, which slowed her down, and then a round to her turbaned head.
Stan was now shaking, his bravado slipping away by his realization of just what they were up against.
'Sir, what do we do now?'
David saw dozens more of the infected now converging on them.
'Now would be a good time to run for our lives.'
They sprinted through the streets, hearing the footsteps of their pursuers just behind them. Every once in a while David would turn and fire a shot or two. Running at full tilt, he had no hope of hitting them, least of all in the head, but he hoped that it would at least slow them down. When he saw that it was having no effect, he concentrated on running. The streetlights were now off, and they had no idea of what lay just a few feet away, let alone being sure of whether they were on track to get to the US Embassy. For now, immediate survival was about as far as they could plan.
Stan tripped on something and went down with a howl of pain. David's momentum carried him forward a few feet before he turned on his heels to go back to his fallen comrade. He saw that he was too late. Three of the creatures were now almost upon Stan, less than five feet away. David brought his rifle to bear, and with the night scope on, hit two of them on the forehead. Both went down and the third, a voluptuous woman who must have looked quite striking before her transformation, but now looked like a bleeding, yellowing monster like the others, took a three round burst to the chest which sent her reeling back.
'Stan, come on!'
But Stan did not move, instead he just gripped his ankle and looking at David with eyes that were blank with fear. David now saw several more shadows converging on Stan. The young pilot now looked David straight in the eye.
'Sir, please do it. Don't let me become one of them!'
David knew what he was being asked to do, but his hands felt as if they weighed a ton. Stan screamed again as the first of the wraiths was about to reach him, yellowed and bloodied hands reaching out for him.
'Please, for God's sake. Please.'
David took a deep breath, brought his rifle up and fired a single shot into Stan's head. A collective howl seemed to go up from all the creatures around as they realized they had been deprived. The one who had been reaching for Stan now crouched over his body, turning his lifeless head in his hands and then turned to look at David.
He must have been a middle-aged office goer, perhaps with a family of his own, no more than a day ago. Now his bloodied, yellow face was contorted with hate, and his clothes were in tatters. The black turban hung precariously from his head as he raised a finger towards David and screamed.
Kaaaaaaaaa....fffffff......r.......
David selected full auto on his M4 and a dozen 5.56MM rounds shredded the creature's head. David did not wait to see if it would get up, since a dozen more launched themselves towards him.
He ran as fast as he could, his eyes stinging from the tears that were now running freely down his face.
***
As soon as the woman had looked up at her and screamed, Hina had run downstairs, aware that she was now in terrible danger. She pulled a sofa in front of the main door, hoping it would at least slow the creatures now converging on her house. She was panting from the exertion and was trying to catch her breath, when the window behind her shattered, showering her with glass shards. A yellowed hand reached in and grabbed at her shoulder. In trying to get away, she fell to the ground, and got a closer look at the face that was now peering in at her through the broken window. She saw the crooked glasses, the yellow shirt, and realized with a stifled sob that this creature had till a few minutes ago been Mr. Patel, the man whom she used to buy her groceries from. However the friendly smile she had known for a dozen years was now replaced by bared, bloody teeth. His face was cut in a dozen places, and Hina realized he had used his head to smash the window. His face was yellow, and the skin seemed to be peeling away in patches and his hate filled, crazed eyes seemed more like those of a rabid animal than those of a human being. The turban on his head would have looked absurd had Hina not been so terrified. She heard several more hands beating on the door, and then the sofa, slowly but surely, began to slide back under the onslaught.
At her age, and especially after Imran's passing, Hina had thought of her mortality often. With Imran gone, and her children more a distant memory than a real family, she did not have too many things or people to live for, and on the occasional lonely night, she had wondered if she could bring herself to end it all. A bottle of sleeping pills perhaps. But now, faced with a horde of attackers beating down her door, she realized that she wanted to live. Whether or not she had anything to live for, she did not want to go like this. Most certainly, she did not want to become the kind of monster Mr. Patel had become. The door was now ajar and she saw a foot slip in. The yellow, bloody leg looked incongruous in a Gucci high-heeled sandal, but Hina did not have any time to contemplate that as she got up, looking frantically around for some way to defend herself.
Mayukh's car was now bobbing and weaving around the cluttered street, and in other circumstances, he would almost certainly have been stopped on suspicion of drunk driving. But now, all the cops around were either dead or had joined the marauding bands that were rampaging through the city. He braked hard when he saw a body lying just in front of his car. Both he and his mother looked at it, wondering what they should do. Even though it looked dead, Mayukh could not bring himself to run over another human being. He began to reverse his car so he could drive around it, when the body sat up.