Partyville USA: Part 3-1

Roland woke up early the next morning with his head throbbing and his stomach wrenching with hunger. After trying for half an hour to get back to sleep, he finally resigned himself to consciousness and pushed himself up. He walked out to the wall-mounted First-Aid box and shuffled through its contents in search of aspirin. When he re-closed the box, empty-handed, Jamie walked up to him.

            “Mr. Hicks! I’m glad you’re up, there’s something you should probably see sir.”

            “Whatsit?” Roland grumbled, massaging his head.

            “It’s the elevators sir, come on” Jamie said, walking briskly towards the elevator annex. Roland trudged after him. When they arrived at the elevators, Tim was standing against the wall, staring at the elevators. Roland heard a low groan seep through the closed doors.

            “What in the hell” he said, as a second groan murmured from behind the doors.

            “I think there’s two of them in there” said Tim “at first it sounded like just one, but now it definitely sounds like two.”

            “Jesus” said Roland.

            “My guess is that one chased a person in” said Jamie “they were trying to get up here, but couldn’t get away.”

            “Can they open the doors?” asked Roland.

            “They haven’t since we noticed them,” said Tim “God only knows how long they’ve been in there.”

            “We can’t open them either, the buttons are behind the sign” Jamie added.

            Roland stood and listened to the two distinct groans.

            “Are they talking to each other?”

            “Really hard to say” said Jamie “at times it seems like they are, but you can’t be certain.”

            Roland listened for a minute longer before turning back down the hall.

            “I want you to finish sealing that up,” he said “make damn sure there’s no way they can get out.”

            “Yes Mr. Hicks” Jamie and Tim said in unison.

            Within an hour the rest of the staff had woken from restless sleep. Many retook their places by a TV to watch for updates. There was footage taken from the emergency camps that were now being established in many states. Reports were circulating that the military was finding some ways at curbing the spread, but for as long as the staff watched, there was no word that they were finding ways of containing or even reversing the phenomenon. Further, the military’s containment efforts had not been enough to keep the infection from spreading into Western Pennsylvania, Colorado and Michigan.

            As Roland continued to search for aspirin, he saw Sophie making calls to the floors below. When she set the phone down he approached her desk.

            “Hey Soph,” he said “do we have any aspirin up here.”

            “Sure” Sophie said, opening one of her drawers and removing a small container.

            “Thanks” Roland said after she handed it to him. “How’s it going down there” he asked as he prized off the child-safety cap. Sophie didn’t answer immediately, and appeared to think with great effort through sleep-deprivation, hunger and fatigue.

            “I can’t reach the 11th floor anymore” she said finally.

            “Oh” said Roland.

            “That’s not all,” Sophie said, wearily reclining in her chair “on 12 they say they can hear them below.”

            “What?”

            “They can just hear them, maybe it’s coming through the vents, or somehow through th

e floors, but they can hear this noise coming up.”

            “God.”

            “They can hear it on 13 too, apparently.”

            Roland shook his head. “Thanks Soph” he said as he walked away.

            “No problem,” said Sophie “anytime.”

            Roland took a directionless walk around the office as he waited for the aspirin to kick in. As he neared his office, he could hear people talking in the break room. He walked to it to find Sam, Beverly and Woo-Jin cutting up all of the food in the room with plastic knives and compiling the lot on paper plates at the center of the table as half of the remaining staff looked on. On one plate was a pile of bagel slices, while the other two had sliced apple or banana. Woo-Jin had also rationed out the single yogurt into six sample cups. After Sam finished jaggedly cutting up the last apple, he sat back, mentally calculating how to best divide the food. After a minute, he started removing smaller paper plates from a sleeve, and assembling portions. Most of the plates contained no more than a slice of each item. Beverly and Woo-Jin then began distributing them amongst the employees. Roland grimaced when Woo-Jin handed him his plate. He stared at the ½ inch cross-section of bagel, the slice of banana and the halved slice of apple.

             Roland walked back to the hall, staring almost incredulously at the plate. He thought back to the sublime garlic rye-crusted salmon he had eaten just yesterday. He remembered the last third and small helping of garlic mashed potatoes he had abstained from saving. He thought of it now sitting, stinking in the trash, where it would probably now sit forever. Mirthlessly, he took a small bite out of the slice of bagel.

            “It ain’t right,” Burt said as he tossed his plate in the trash “Hell, I’ve eaten more on a slow samples day at Costco.”

            “If only we were stranded there, we’d be set.”

            “What stings is that we’re given the same to everyone,” Burt said under his breath “a man that makes the blockades has to survive on the same amount of food as those useless flunkies who we’re trying to help?”

            “Don’t look at me, this was Sam’s call, not that he actually discussed whether it was right.”

            “Not that anybody even put him in charge.”

            “I’ll bet next he’ll suggest that we try negotiating with those things.”

            Roland’s headache was finally starting to recede. He went for a walk to clear his head. The TV’s he passed were showing footage of the military setting up fortifications in what appeared to be Ohio, as well as footage of families entering emergency shelters. He saw that the door to the conference room was slightly ajar, and from the inside he could hear light sobbing. He gingerly pushed the door open to see Luanne at the end chair facing away from the door. She didn’t turn around as Roland shut the door behind him. He walked up beside her. He saw her phone laying on the carpet, still open. He could even faintly hear the phone’s female voice listing options.

            “I can’t reach them” Luanne said meekly.

            “I’m sorry” Roland said, putting a hand on her shoulder. Her trembling left hand slowly raised and laid upon his. Luanne was struggling and failing to hold herself together.

            “You’ll stay with me, right?” She said, her voice cracking in effort.

            “Don’t worry about a thing” said Roland. He could hear murmur outside the door, and stepped towards the doors to Wallace’s office.

            “Here,” he said, placing his hand on the knob “let’s get away from them.”

            Luanne sniffed and nodded as Roland turned the door and swung it open. He watched her as he did, seeing a small shudder of relief percolate in her. As he fully opened the door, her eyes suddenly went wide, and she screamed. Roland swung around to see Tim Rourke laying on the floor, dead. Roland looked closer and saw, just protruding from his left eye socket was the tip of Wallace’s pen, a slow trickle of blood dripping off the tip of it. The doors to the office flew open as coworkers ran in, responding to Luanne’s screams. There were gasps and other isolated screams. Roland slammed the door shut and stepped over to them.

            “Just don’t look” he yelled “stay calm!” He opened the

other door to the office and tried to lead out his stunned coworkers. When they dispersed back into the office, he pulled Woo-Jin and Jamie aside and had them cover Tim’s body and store him in one of the furthest offices. He instructed them to be as covert as they could, but they still couldn’t help being spotted by several people. Even they appeared badly shaken when they returned, not looking or talking to each other. The people who had seen them cowered in empty cubicles. Lisa Chan even shut her eyes and began frantically murmuring to herself in her native Korean. Beverly, who hadn’t even seen Tim’s body began sobbing hysterically until Sam led her into an empty office. Through the door Roland could hear him desperately trying to calm her down to little avail. Roland looked across the office. Those who weren’t openly distraught were huddled around someone who was, and many looked at him with grave, pleading faces. He saw that as scattered as everyone was, nobody would stand as close as twenty feet from any of the windows.

            “That’s not true” he heard Sam say through the door “they’re fine, I’m sure…well that doesn’t mean…look maybe their phones aren’t working.”

            “We’re all going to die, aren’t we” Kate Nelson said to Roland. He looked at her but said nothing.

            “Aren’t we?” she repeated, her trembling eyes locked unblinking on his.

            “Aren’t we?!” she said “Aren’t we?! We’re all gonna die! They’re going to get up here, they’re going to get in and we’re all going to die!”

            “No” Roland said finally.

            “Aren’t we?” she said meekly, not seeming to have heard him.

            “No, we aren’t,” Roland said, raising his head to project over the office “We aren’t. Look…we have all of the entrances blocked off securely. We’re calling for help, we’re -”

            “Don’t you think they blocked off the entrances on the third floor?” Sophie interrupted from the other end of the room. “Or the tenth? Don’t you think everyone below is tried everything they could to stop those things? That they tried to stop them or fight them off? They all tried.”

            “Even if they take two week to get up here we’ll die of starvation,” said Tom Shoemaker “or more of us will just do what Tim did so we don’t have to spend another having nothing to do but wait til they get here.”

            “No,” Roland said firmly “nobody else is doing that. We have to just hang in there. We have to stick together. We have to keep hoping.”

            “What fucking hope is there?” Sophie cried “Haven’t you been watching the news? It’s only getting worse out there! Within three days it will probably be on the coasts. They’ll be in Canada, Mexico! Even if they somehow find a way to stop them, they’ll never get back to us in time.”

            “They will” said Roland, rubbing his brow “somehow, we’ll find a way out of this. Sophie stared furiously at him for a minute before shaking her head and storming back into the conference room, muttering something to herself as she did.

            “They’re dead!” Beverly howled from the office, this time audible to most of the staff.

            “Look” Roland said as his coworkers turned away or back to their friends “I know this looks bad. Trust me, I’m scared too…” Nobody was paying attention to him.

            “But we can’t just allow ourselves to lose hope! We’re Partyville USA god damn it! We conquered Nebraska, the Dakotas! We can get through this!”

            Roland stood with hands outstretched for a response, but none came. He sagged and his hands dropped to his side. Slowly, he walked away down the hall.

            “They’re dead!” he heard Beverly repeat as he turned the corner.

            He stepped back into his office. His briefcase was still on the table. He walked to it and gently laid his hand on the flap. He kept it there for a minute without opening it, as though he momentarily forgotten if he wanted to or not. As he stood, there was a quiet knock on his door. He turned and saw Luanne peek around the door.

            &

ldquo;Hey baby” she said.

            “Hey.” 

            She walked over and hugged him, his arms lifted wearily around her back.

            “I’m sorry” she said “they just can’t see now that you’re just trying to keep us optimistic about things.”

            “I’m doing my best” said Roland “and they don’t care.”

            “They do” said Luanne “They will. I know you, you’ll find a way.”

            Roland tightened his arms around Luanne, his chin drew into her shoulder.

            “I know,” Luanne said “they’ll come around. They’ll see the same wonderful man I see.”

            “I love you” Roland whispered to her neck.

            “I love you too” said Luanne, sniffling “I really, really love you.”       In time Roland emerged from his office. He noticed that he couldn’t hear any TVs on, or any radios. His coworkers were still sitting around, alone or attending. Some still made calls to relatives, though fewer were able to reach any. When he saw that nobody was looking, he quietly re-entered Wallace’s office. There was now a rug placed over the spot where Tim had died, as no one was willing to clean the blood out of the carpet. Roland realized that nobody would intrude on him in Wallace’s office anymore. People would avoid it like they avoided standing next to the windows, or venturing down the hall towards the office where Tim’s body lay. He smiled slightly as he reopened Wallace’s portrait and poured out the last of the whiskey.

            He sipped the glass and felt the spiky warmth of the liquor drift down his throat and plop into his empty stomach. The whiskey worked fast due to his hunger, and soon he was feeling better. At one point, he even walked to the window and didn’t see anybody. The street below was empty, except for the traffic jam that still sat. Minutes passed and Roland began to wonder if something really had happened. He began to wonder if it really would be possible to make it down to the street, and escape. But as he began to craft plans for what to do, and where to go, he saw a single man stagger out from under the building. He then saw trio far up near the end of the traffic jam. He sighed heavily and stepped back from the window and slumped into Wallace’s chair. When he finally finished his whiskey, he took another look outside. There were five then. Four were moving between the cars, but one was standing on the curb, looking up. From the distance, Roland couldn’t tell where exactly he was looking, or even if he was looking at anything at all. He simply stood and looked up, not moving. Eventually, Roland backed away from the window, and returned the empty glass to the cabinet.