“Sir, it’s another sample from Chengdu.”
“A false positive you mean?”
“No sir, the analysis indicates an Asian H5N1 avian strain. We’re on it.”
“Well,” the man snorted, “this time it sure as hell isn’t false. They’re all suffering from some virulent form of flu. The military’s trying to cover it up, but it’s spreading.”
“How far has it gone?”
“There was a small case thirty miles southeast of Chengdu. That’s the closest to us. We’ve shut down all air traffic.”
“What about bringing in supplies?”
“We can’t risk it. No one’s coming out.”
“So, what are you doing?”
“We’ve taken over a large tent encampment of nomads. They’re all sick, but they’re still alive. We are feeding them as best we can and treating some of them.”
“Supplies?”
“Not yet. There’s a lot of them and we’re running out.”
“Good, the towns are too full. What else?”
“We’re setting up quarantine zones. Most are doable, but we haven’t gotten to all of them. You’ll see from the wall-map.”
“What’s the extent of the infection?”
“I don’t know. We’ve reached so many of these that I have trouble keeping track.”
“No problem. We’ll have everything mapped by nightfall and mapped correctly. Get started. I want to see everything by sundown.”
Pavel woke up confused and scared. Car horns were blaring, and all lights were blazing inside the apartment. He tried to get out of bed, but winced in pain. He was finally able to get up and stagger to the window. After a minute it became clear.
It was nighttime, but illumination from the street lamps left thin shadows, cast by cars and people rushing about. Hundreds of cars were stopped in the street, and there were crowds of people at every intersection. On the streets were groups of people looking at maps held by soldiers. The soldiers directed the pedestrians with bullhorns. Ambulances, police cars, and military vehicles flashed by, but the sirens were muted. None of the vehicles went over three miles per hour, but they were still uncontrollable in the dense traffic. Children were running up and down the streets from one military vehicle to another, asking for candy.
Pavel was in and out of consciousness, but he finally noticed that the apartment was dark. He could barely see his family sleeping on the floor by the kitchen. The apartment was nearly empty. The top of his dresser from his bedroom was lying on the kitchen table. The cupboard doors were open. All the sheetrock from the wall between the kitchen and the living room was on the floor.
Pavel passed out on the bathroom floor.
Pavel awoke to a bright light and a painful stabbing sensation in his left eye. He was looking into a mirror. His vision was blurred and his head hurt. He had no idea what happened or where he was.
Prisoner #14493-P of Mongolia emerged from shock. His hands and legs were tied to the bed, but he ignored the pain. The black tarpaulin on the floor in the cell was drenched in blood and soaked in urine. The stink was unbearable. The only light was the fluorescent lamp illuminating the steel bars. The concrete floor was atrocious, with puddles of urine and blood. Before he collapsed, the prisoner had watched an Asian woman and several military personnel in the next cell. One was standing guard.
One white-coated medic was holding a needle above the man’s shoulder. He gloated over the prisoner as he passed out, saying, “I hope this is the last time you’ll wake up. You’ll suffer a lot before you die, asshole.” The prisoner was going to protest, but his body was exhausted, and the man hit him with the needle anyway. The injection was quick and by the time he woke up again, he was fully conscious. He realized he was tied to the bed and had been injected with an anesthetic. His vision remained blurry.
Prisoner #14493-P turned his head as best he could toward the door. He could hear something about five meters away. “Can you hear me?” he said loudly. He could hear a flapping sound. “Can you hear me? Who’s there?”
The prisoner struggled to get up and flailed in pain. “Can you hear me?” he said again.
The sound got closer. The prisoner’s vision was still blurry. He saw a bright light coming through a window next to his bed.
“14493-P, can you hear me?” a voice said from the other side of the door. The voice was barely audible.
The prisoner sat up and looked toward the window. The light was behind a flock of birds. One bird landed between the prisoner and the window.
The prisoner realized he was doing everything wrong, and tried to calm down and be still; he was scared. He was in a prison cell bed, and his head hurt. He was confused and scared. His muscles ached; he was sore. He was dizzy. His left eye burned painfully.
The prisoner was confused. He did not know how he got there. The building looked like some sort of detention facility, but why would he be in prison, and where was his family? He could have sworn he was in Chengdu, China. The last thing he could remember was talking to a co-worker.
“I’ll have a beer later. I have to get my daughter ready for school,” the voice said. It was a male voice voice, he could hear clearly.
“You should get some sleep,” the prisoner said.
“I’ll try.”
The bird startled him when it landed on the light. “Damn birds,” said the prisoner. “Get it out of here.”
“That’s 14493-P, can you hear me?” someone said from the next room. The voice was far away and hard to understand through the window.
The bird began to move again. “Birds…” the prisoner moaned. There were more voices through the window. Why was there glass, he wondered?
The prisoner moved his side painfully toward the door. “Get me out of here, you bastards,” he said loud enough to hear, but no one heard him. He was still extremely weak. The door was cold with no knob. He looked closely and saw a tiny hole. The plastic matting on the floor was soaked with blood and urine.
He could barely see through the hole. His vision was still blurry. “No one cares,” he whispered to the hole. He looked through a window next to his bed, and saw a small plastic chair, a pale blue blanket and a white sheet. He was confused. The prisoner looked through the walls in both directions. There were no lights on; there were no people in sight. The cell seemed to be about the size of two of his rooms in China.
The prisoner could not stand the cold anymore; it was too much for him to bear. “Get me out of here,” he said to the empty room. He was on the floor, but the floor was dirty so he sat back up. He did not know what to do to get people to help.
He heard the flapping sound again. It was hard to see the bird clearly. He thought or he was hallucinating. There was a breeze. The prisoner shivered. The bird and the breeze brought his attention to the open window. The window was dirty, and he could see the flapping bird as it flew up and back out to a trash can. The sound was more audible. Prisoner #14493-P looked awake now.
“14493-P!” yelled the voice from the next room.
The prisoner was confused. He decided to identify himself to whoever it was that said they knew him. He struggled to stand up. “Here! Who are you?”
“14493-P, can you hear me?” the voice from the other room said.
The prisoner stepped toward the door. “What the hell is going on?” he said.
“14493-P.” The prisoner could not see the speaker.
“I can’t see you,” the prisoner yelled, “but I can hear you.”
“You’re in a gym. You’re in China. You’ve been here longer than a week.”
“What are you?”
“You’ve been here longer than a week. You’ve been taken hostage.”
“By who?”
“Enough questions. You need to listen. You’re in China. It’s the Forbidden City.”
“Am I in a chamber?”
“Yes.”
“Who else is here?” he said.
“None of your business.”
The prisoner was pissed. “I’ll make you bastards pay,” he said. He tried to open the door, but it was locked. “This is for the boy with the ruined face,” he said. He tried to kick the door, but he quickly lost his balance and fell on his face. He struggled to his knees and looked closely at the door. It looked like a breezeway. It was actually a glass door in front of a wooden one. He saw a small hole in the glass door. It was about the size of his finger. The glass was covered with dust, dirt, and leaves. There was not enough light to see through the glass door.
The prisoner stepped over to the door and squatted down. He tried to listen, but he could not hear anything but the flapping of the birds. He tried to scream to get someone’s attention. No one could hear him. “Where am I? What am I doing here?” the prisoner asked.
“This is your cage. Just be quiet.”
“I’m going to make you pay, you…”
“Just be quiet.”
The prisoner made his way back to the bed and fell down. “That’s enough.” said the voice.
“Be quiet.”
“Who are you?”
The prisoner’s head throbbed. The voices were close, but he could not tell who was speaking. He sat up on the bed. “Where am I?” he asked.
“You get some sleep.”
The prisoner fell back on the bed and closed his eyes. He did not feel his left eye burn anymore. He did not feel anything. The next thing he knew, he was on the floor again screaming, and then he was back in the chamber.
