Dark Days

“Buenos Aires was one of the largest urban centers in the Southern Hemisphere. Millions of people were packed into a relatively small area. As the rest of the world was falling apart, Buenos Aires didn’t have a single case of infection. Not one. It was one of the few civilized places on the planet that were ‘clean,’ but no one took any preventive measures. A week later, when thousands of refugees flocked to the city, no one oversaw their arrival, checked their health, or set up a quarantine. Nothing, as surprising as that may seem. When cases of the epidemic turned up in an overcrowded urban area, nobody—absolutely nobody—bothered to take control. The Argentine military tried to imitate its neighbor, Chile, and overthrow the government, but the civilian government didn’t go down easy. There were demonstrations, shootings, an aborted coup in extremis… As the world was disintegrating, the Argentines were stunned by the power struggle among their leaders. Finally someone got really scared, but it was too late. Members of the government absconded with all the money they could get their hands on and hopped on a plane headed for God-knows-where.”

Alicia took out a pack of cigarettes and offered me one. I took it in silence and let her light it. Interestingly, she didn’t light one for herself but put the pack back in her pocket. I was mesmerized by the way she flicked her lighter on and off as she talked.

“I don’t know where those assholes went, but I hope those monsters got every one of them,” she sighed, shaking her head. “Two weeks after that, the Embalse Nuclear Power Station, near the city of Cordoba, blew up, casting a radioactive cloud over the entire north. No one ordered the shutdown of the plant. Operators disappeared. No one stopped the system from failing. In a brutal example of negligence, every government official dropped the ball. We assume that the plant kept operating unattended until the uranium destabilized and set off a chain reaction that ended in nuclear explosion. All of northern Argentina and southern Brazil are now a radioactive wasteland, where life is impossible, except for the Undead. Of course, they’re already dead!” she said, frowning.

“How can people do shit like that?”

“In Asia things were even worse. The Chinese lost their heads and tried to eradicate the disease from their main population centers with controlled nuclear explosions.”

“NUCLEAR BOMBS?” I couldn’t believe that was true, even though I’d heard about it when there were still TV newscasts.

“The value of human life is more relative in other cultures. What’s inconceivable in the West makes perfect sense to a person from the East where the community matters most, not the individual. If you can save the community by eliminating tens of millions of individuals in one fell swoop, no matter if they’re healthy or sick, you don’t hesitate.”

“And that was their strategy.”

“That was their strategy,” Alicia replied, nodding.

“Did it work?”

“Not one bit. Radiation can’t kill someone who’s already dead. Sure, they incinerated millions of Undead, along with millions of innocent people. Given that country’s dense population, even if only a small percentage of Undead survived the explosion, that equates to millions surviving who then scattered in every direction from the razed cities.” Her eyes bored into me. “Think about it.”

“Absolute chaos… worldwide,” I whispered.

“We aren’t the worst. In Asia and the Middle East, human life is no longer possible. At least, life as we know it. As for Africa… the stories the few survivors have told us are shocking. Africa is hell on earth. We surmise there’s almost no one living on the continent, except for small, isolated groups scattered throughout the rainforest or Tuareg nomads roaming the Sahara desert. Dozens of small-time kings and warlords filled the power vacuum when the governments collapsed. Disease, war, famine, and nature swept away anyone the Undead didn’t get. Africa has regressed hundreds of years,” she said with a frown. “The living are almost more dangerous than the Undead.”

“We stopped in a fishing village on the coast of Morocco.”

“You said in your statement it had been ravaged by ‘fire and the sword,’ as the saying goes. That’s the pattern all across the continent. It’s a fight to the death for resources and survival.”

“Resources? Africa is probably the most fertile place on earth! It could easily provide food for the rest of humanity!”

Alicia laughed and looked at me as if she knew a huge secret but wasn’t sure whether to tell me.

“We don’t just need food. We’re running desperately low on all the basics: medicine, fuel, clothing, ammunition, vehicles that run. Think about it: Every box of medicine our hospitals consume means one less box of medicine in the world. Every gallon of fuel our helicopters burn means that much less transportation by air. Every bullet we fire at those bastards takes us one step closer to defending ourselves with bows and arrows! No industry, no international trade, no technology, no tankers bringing fuel into ports. Think the world’s a mess now? Wait a couple of years and you’ll look back on this as the good old days. We are rushing headlong into a new Dark Ages. And as long as those creatures are out there, there’s not a thing we can do about it!”

“But there must be something we can do…”

“If you’ve got a brilliant idea none of us has thought of, pal, lay it on the table right now,” she replied, half mocking, half serious. “I guarantee you’ll be the most popular guy on the islands.”

“But I thought civilization on the islands still worked. I assumed this was the real Safe Haven where we could all continue our lives!”

Alicia looked at me for a moment, then she stood up and motioned for me to follow her. “Come with me. There’s something I want to show you.”

15

We went back on deck. Twilight glowed red on the horizon as a warm, sand-laden wind blew across the harbor, turning the air into hot, thick soup. Each breath felt like I was shoveling boiling air into my lungs. As soon as we left the cool air conditioning inside, we started to sweat. I wished I still had some of that soda.

Alicia walked to the gunwale and absentmindedly offered me another cigarette. I shook my head. I was light-headed and my mouth was as dry as the desert. After a month in that cell, I had an attack of vertigo as I walked down the Galicia’s long runway. In silence, we looked at the city that encircled the bay. Lights started to glow as darkness closed in. I was just about to ask about the fate of my friends, but before I could say anything, Alicia pointed to the port.

“See that ship? The biggest one, across from those tall buildings.”

I looked where she was pointing. A massive ship painted bright blue, much larger than any other vessel in the harbor, bobbed lazily in the waves. It sat unusually high in the water, exposing a wide swath of its topside that would normally be underwater. That could only mean that the vessel had no cargo in its holds.

“That’s the Keiten Maru, a Japanese supertanker. It used to belong to one of the largest conglomerates in Japan before the Apocalypse. That monster can transport one-hundred-and-fifteen thousand tons of crude oil. As all hell was breaking loose, it was returning from the North Sea loaded with Norwegian oil, bound for Japan. Before reaching the Canaries, three crew members died of TSJ, including the first mate. Even as crew members were falling ill, the uninfected survivors managed to round up the Undead and lock them in a hold. But panic broke out, so they dropped anchor here. Then the world collapsed and the ship was stranded forever. Paradoxically, its misfortune was our salvation. Without the Keiten Maru, we wouldn’t have had a chance.” Alicia’s pale eyes seemed to look right through me.

“Why’s that? What linked that ship to the fight against the Undead?”

“That massive load of crude. We refined all that wonderful stuff into fuel,” she said, pointing to the towers that dotted the horizon.

Of course! The Cepsa Refinery.

“When the system collapsed and the islands were cut off from the world, we had enough fuel for two weeks, tops. The Keiten Maru brought us an adequate fuel supply. But, despite strict rationing, we’ve been burning through the last of our supply for a month. At this rate, we’ll use up the last liter in four or five weeks.”