It happened without warning.
One
moment a woman pushing her baby stroller was smiling at her friend walking
beside her, the next they both lay on the cement as a car heading straight for
them sped up with no intention of slowing down. A red-headed man talking on his
cell phone collapsed, and without another word he lied still. A young girl two
paces ahead of me fell face-first into the pavement. A motorcycle zipped
through the intersection and crashed through the store-front window.
This
all happened mid-sip of my mocha. The coffee scalded my tongue as it sat in my
mouth for too long, unable to swallow out of paralysis of the events conspiring
around me. It was as though everyone was controlled by a hypnotist and he had
snapped his fingers, bringing everyone into a deep sleep.
Everyone
but me.
The
sound of a plane whistled in the sky above me, and I looked up to see the metallic
figure ripping through the air at speeds almost incapable of following. A
stream of clouds trailed the bottom, and it was then I realized the plane was
emitting something. Smoke? Was it about to crash? The smoke – or whatever it
was – fell like snow to the ground.
I
looked left. Then right. Again, both ways, then behind and ahead. Something was wrong. Horribly, horribly wrong.
I
tried to deny it at first, but then panic set in.
I dropped my coffee
and I ran.
I needed to know if there were others, others like me that
were panicking and running. To where, I had no idea, but somewhere, anywhere
but here. But each body I passed was proof, another piece to the puzzle to verify
that what I had just witnessed was real and not a dream.
I turned down an alley, leaned against a worn brick building
and, for the first time in three years since my father died, cried.
I did not hear anyone approach until a hand grabbed my
peacoat’s collar and pulled me from the ground. He was older than I,
mid-twenties perhaps, short raven hair that matched his plain black t-shirt
tucked fittingly into his black cargo pants. So much black, I could have
mistaken him for Death. I did not know how accurate that comparison was until later.
The man brought his wristwatch up to his mouth. He said into
it, “Found one. Male. Late teen, early adult.”
The watch responded with a drawl, “Bring him in.”
That was all that needed to be said. “You’re coming with me.”
He grabbed my arm, holding it tightly as though he wished to snap either my
radius or ulna in two.
“Hey, let me go!” The pain ran up my arm and into the whole
of my body.
“You need to come with us for your own protection.”
“I’ll go! You don’t have to drag me!”
He didn’t respond, nor did he let go.
I heard screams.
As we turned the corner, there were other men like this guy –
all dressed in black from head to toe – dragging others like myself past piles
of bodies. Some were hysterical, the sudden deaths of those around them causing
them to lose it all. I only just realized how almost completely sane I was. A vehicle
that looked almost like a tank by design but without the turret and gun sat in
the middle of the street, the track it used for movement carelessly crushing
corpses. A large door leading into the back of the vehicle slammed down to
reveal others in chains. The light blinded them for a moment, and then they
madly tried to break the restraints that held them in place.
Protection never looked so frightening.
And if this was protection, then I did not want to be
protected.
I heard an odd zipping noise. My arm no longer felt crushed,
and the man holding me suddenly slumped to the ground. Red liquid that could
only be blood oozed from an unexpected hole in his neck.
“If
you want to live, I’d come this way.”
My
instinct guided my sight back into the alley, and a man with earth-colored but
graying hair motioned for me with his fingers. In one of his hands was a
handgun.
If
there was one thing I had ever learned from television – state approved
television, that is – it is to never say “no” to a man with a gun.
