Omega Plague: Collapse (8 page)

“Look,” Bruno started, then paused. “I guess . . . well,
what’s next?”

Cristian didn’t respond. He leaned back in the chair. After
looking at the ceiling for a moment, Cristian leaned forward.

“It seems I’m officially in command here, at least for a
while.”

Bruno wasn’t surprised. Cristian had a number of years more
experience than himself.

Cristian continued. “And I spoke to Commissario Esposito.
He’s quite happy continuing Operation Whisky-Tango-Foxtrot. He’s already had to
deflect some inquiries from his own higher-ups.”

Bruno gave him a puzzled look.

“Oh, come on,” Cristian responded. “You know—the weapons
confiscation order.”

Bruno still looked puzzled. “All right, but why
‘Whisky-Tango-Foxtrot’?”

Cristian laughed. “I thought our little deception needed an
appropriate military designation: Operation W-T-F. That’s the English
abbreviation for ‘Ma Che Cazzo!’”

Bruno shook his head, with a pale smile playing around his
lips. Cristian did his best never to take anything too seriously, not even the
end of civilization.

Bruno straightened up in his chair and turned on the monitor
at his desk, swiping his fingers on the screen and ignoring the keyboard.
Cristian brought his chair around so that he could see the screen.

“What are you looking for?” asked Cristian.

Bruno didn’t answer immediately, nor did he look up at
Cristian. Instead, he continued to swipe.

“This,” said Bruno, pointing at the monitor.

The monitor displayed a map of the Naples region. Bruno’s
finger hovered over the island of Capri. It was now the color of night, as was
the entire coastline.

“Christ,” said Cristian. “It’s finally spread to Capri.”

Bruno stared at the monitor and nodded his head. “It’s
here.”

“So, what do you think will happen?” Cristian asked, a
quiver in his voice. “The British PM is dead. The government has called up all
military reserves. What’s next?”

Bruno shook his head. “The ruin of everything—the ruin of it
all.”

Chapter 6

October 25

Bruno's boots pounded on the street. Veri had been right. No
one cared about enforcing the weapons confiscation order anymore. Cristian
followed behind him as they chased three men through Capri’s main square, out
onto a side street.

Bruno stopped short when the three figures darted out of
their sight, deciding not to pursue them down the narrow alleys in the fading
light. If he had continued, he would have shot them all.

Cristian jostled into Bruno as he looked down the street
where the looters had fled.

“What? You’re letting them go?”

Bruno didn’t look at Cristian, thinking it best to keep both
eyes where the looters had run, until he was quite certain they were gone.
“We’d have to shoot them if we caught them. I didn’t get a good look at them. I
think they were just getting food.” He looked at Cristian. “They didn’t deserve
to die.” The order to shoot looters on sight had come down two days ago as
chaos grew in the major cities.

Cristian shook his head. “I can’t fucking believe they
emptied the prisons last week!” Cristian gestured in the general direction of
the thieves. “This is what happens!”

Bruno holstered his pistol. “Could’ve been worse, though.
They might have tried to fight.”

“Well,” Cristian responded, holstering his own pistol. “I
doubt the only ones released were the so-called ‘nonviolent’ offenders.”

“I bet the real reason they released so many is because
there aren’t enough prison guards left now.”

“Exactly. Sick, or dead, or even more likely, just AWOL,”
Cristian said. Then he patted his pistol. “Good thing we can do something about
it.”

“For now,” said Bruno. “That is, until we run out of ammo.”
In the fifteen days since the Naples raid, so many were sick, or afraid of
getting sick, that the networks most people in the cities relied upon for their
survival teetered on the edge of total collapse. Too many people sick and not
working led to fuel shortages, which led to transportation problems, which led
to shortages of goods, and on and on and on: cascading failure. Things
unraveled faster than Bruno could have believed possible.

Cristian shrugged. “I don’t know how many hundreds of rounds
we have in the station. Enough to last quite a while I think.”

“You can never have enough bullets. Not now,” said Bruno.

“Could be worse. Unlike real zombies, this lot doesn’t need
a head shot to stop them. One or two in the chest should do it.”

Bruno grunted in response as he turned his back on the
narrow street and broke into a brisk walk. “There’s no one else here. We should
go back to the station. It’s been warm the last few days, and I don’t want to
take any chances with mosquitoes either.”

Bruno looked around at the piazza as they made the short
walk back to their station. The fading light rendered the scene before him all
the more cheerless. The boarded-up shops and restaurants contrasted sharply
with the sparkling nightlife only weeks earlier.

“How many people are left on the island, I wonder,” said
Bruno, more to himself than Cristian, as they made their way back to the
station.

“Who knows, really. There might still be quite a few holed
up here and there.”

Since the disease had spread to Capri, the trickle of people
leaving for the mainland had become a flood. They left by motorboat, rowboat,
or any other means they had. Over the last few days, Bruno and Cristian watched
people spill all around the piers and docks of the main marina, most with
suitcases, clothes, anything they could carry that they thought had value.

Bruno shook his head. “Those people who left, they should
have stayed put, here. I guess they thought their chances were better with
relatives on the mainland.”

“Maybe,” said Cristian. “But with all the military
checkpoints, if they got stuck in Naples, they’re as good as dead.”

“True. And not just in Naples,” responded Bruno. “You’ve
heard the reports—all over the country, people are trying to leave the
cities—trying to leave death behind.”

Cristian built on Bruno’s glum assessment. “Seems like the
only ones left are the ones who couldn’t or wouldn’t leave, and the ones who
prey on anyone left.”

They walked together in silence for a few moments. Something
had been gnawing at Bruno since yesterday, and now that they could take a
breather he asked, “Have you heard from Carla? She’s living at the hospital
full-time. We texted a few days ago. We were supposed to meet yesterday, but
she didn’t show up and I can’t get through to her. If I don’t hear from her
today, I’m going to the hospital.”

“Don’t bother. I tried to get in the hospital to see Carla,
but they have guards there, and they wouldn’t let me in,” said Cristian.

“But that’s impossible. You’re a Carabiniere. They
have
to let you in.”

“Didn’t matter that I was a Carabiniere. They said they’re
operating under some kind of emergency regulations. No one gets in.”

“Cristian, I’ve got to get to her. I’ve tried text, phone,
e-mail. Nothing. When we spoke last she sounded strange, like—”

“Like what?”

Bruno shook his head. “I’m not sure. She sounded like—” But
the thought he was about to vocalize sounded as crazy to Bruno as the ham radio
guy, so instead he shrugged and said, “Guess it must be stress from dealing
with everything. But as soon as the station is squared away and my shift is
over, I’m going to the hospital. At least there are guards there. She should be
safe, right?”

“Of course she’s safe. Hope you have better luck getting in
than I did,” said Cristian as they arrived at their station. They entered, and
promptly barricaded the outer door and the inner door with tables as they
passed through.

They pulled their masks down as they entered the main
office. The overhead lights blinked on in response to their movements. “Good,”
said Cristian. “The power’s on.” In the last few days, the power grid had teetered
on the edge, with rolling brownouts, then blackouts. With mobile phone networks
and the Internet sluggish and unreliable too, old broadcast radio surpassed
streaming media for obtaining information.

Cristian went right to the desk in the middle of the room,
and while donning his headset, began to dial the landline telephone. He stood
with his arms folded at his chest, his leg bouncing with impatience. Then
without warning, he threw the headset on his desk.

“Fucking voice mail! I’m trying to call Esposito at the
police and all I get is voice mail? We need to tell them about those three
thugs. Where are the police?”

Bruno’s face showed no emotion. “Deserted—or dead.”

“Well, turn on the radio—let’s at least see if we can find
out what the hell is going on.”

Bruno turned on the small radio on the desk in the middle of
the office. The voice sounded soft and lilting:

“We must have faith that through this darkness a light will
shine. We must trust that God’s plan will see us through to the other side of
these trials. We must pray that—”

“Please!” Bruno groaned as he slapped the radio, turning it
off. “Who wants to hear that?”

“That’s the Pope!”

“So what? Please, don’t tell me you actually believe
anything he says.”

“At least find another station! We need to hear what else is
going on.”

Bruno brought the radio to life again and hit the scan
button immediately. He didn’t think he could stand another second of the Pope.
The radio settled on the next strongest broadcast: the all-news channel.

North Africa burned from Cairo to Marrakesh, with
governments in full collapse, chaos in the cities, and refugees seeking escape
from the disease. The news in Europe, too, painted a grim picture. The rest of
the Old Continent staggered in various states of strife, some places worse than
others. France, in particular, suffered. The news reports Bruno heard froze his
blood. The turmoil in most major French cities made the austerity riots from a
few years back look positively mild in comparison. Looters and rioters torched
the city centers of Lille, Marseille, Nantes, Lyons, Nice, and parts of Paris.
Bruno feared the last images in his mind of the City of Lights would be smoke
choking the Champs-Élysées. The Brits had already clamped down London tight
before France went up in flames, and the Bundeswehr flooded the streets of
Berlin, too. But Bruno wondered if anything would be enough.

Cristian brushed off the bleak news with a wave. “I don’t
give a damn about France. I want to know what’s going on here.”

Italy seemed to have weathered the death of its prime
minister better than France had dealt with the demise of its president. Never
before had a French president died in office, and shock gripped the nation.
Ironically, having a revolving door of prime ministers for decades meant that
the Italian Prime Minister’s death didn’t cause nearly the kind of turmoil
there as the same event caused in northern Europe. Hell, we even had an ex-PM
kidnapped and murdered in the ‘70s, Bruno recalled from a school history
lesson, and the country went on.

Bruno touched the scan button again and the radio found the
next station. Whatever station this was overflowed with commentary on what was
left of the American military and its withdrawal from all over the globe,
including from Italy and the rest of the Western Alliance. The two male
commentators’ attitude rang clear: “good riddance.”

They ranted that it was one thing for the American president
to condemn but tolerate a state like Montana’s secession, but it was quite
another to let Texas get away with seizing oil wells just before cutting ties
to the US government. The commentators agreed that the President couldn’t just
stand idly by—she had to take action now, and the remnants of American armed
forces had to be called home.

Whoever these radio morons were, they proclaimed that many
people in Europe were happy to see the Americans go. They claimed the social
media were in “a lather,” churning with the notion that the Americans were
behind HAV. The commentators, for their part, blamed either the Americans, the
Russians, or the Chinese (in that order) for the outbreak. How could something
this deadly be natural? they asked. How could this thing not be genetically
engineered, a bioweapon, either out of control or deliberately released? How
could anyone believe the American line of bullshit that the disease was either
a mutated natural strain of the AIDS virus or a terrorist enhanced one?

The Americans’ exodus brought to mind the ancient Romans
forsaking Britain, abandoning the periphery, in hopes of protecting the core of
the Empire. But their withdrawal only delayed the inevitable, and the Romans
and their Empire ultimately faded to dust. Still, Bruno was convinced that
without the Americans, the only thing keeping war from sweeping from one end of
Eurasia to the other was the virus itself. It spread so quickly and so many
were sick, dying, or absent, that there were not enough numbers left to mount
any major military campaigns. And so none of the major (or even minor) powers
had used nukes—at least, not yet anyway. What would be the point? Even the
crazy leaders understood that. Or so Bruno hoped.

“The news is worthless—pure propaganda!” Cristian exclaimed.
“Did you hear about Lampedusa?”

“Yeah, that’s where they’re putting all the Libyan
refugees.”

“But what’s
not
on the news is that they’ve evacuated
all Italian nationals from the entire island. It’s just one big refugee camp.
The Guardia Costiera is just dumping anyone they intercept trying to get to
Italy and letting them fend for themselves.”

“Jesus. But how do you know?”

“That’s what my friends in the Guardia told me. And I
believe them,” said Cristian.

“But how can they keep it a secret?”

“Who’s on Lampedusa is the last thing anyone cares about
right now.” Cristian wandered off to his desk and stood in front of his
monitor. “I’m going to see if we have any message traffic.”

Cristian’s finger traced patterns on the monitor. Then he
abruptly stopped and backed away. Bruno was wondering what was on the screen
when Cristian waved Bruno over. “You’d better take a look at this.” Bruno
turned the radio volume down, and the raving morons faded to a low buzz.

Cristian pointed to the monitor. “Look at this.”

Bruno pulled up a chair and sat down, all the while reading
the information. “They can’t do this!”

Cristian’s response was definitive. “Oh yes they can. We’re
to initiate shut-down procedures and lock this place down. The speedboat will
pick us up at 22:30 hours tomorrow at the Marina Grande. End of story.”

“We can’t. We might be the only cops left here on the
island!”

“Don’t you get it? They need reinforcements in the big
cities, since, on top of everything that’s going on, the idiots in the Ministry
of the Interior let out these supposed ‘nonviolent’ prisoners for ‘humanitarian
reasons.’ Now look around—it’s chaos—and Naples . . .” Cristian’s voice trailed
into silence before quickly regaining its strength. “Naples will burn! The
small stations—this island—they’re nothing.”

Bruno pondered Cristian’s words. He stood up from the chair
and turned to him. “I’m not leaving the island. At least not until I talk to
Carla again.”

Cristian turned his back to Bruno, walking away from the
desk. “You can do whatever you want,” said Cristian. “I’m leaving. But not with
the Carabinieri.”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“I made arrangements this morning with a friend in Naples.
He’s got a small boat, and he’s agreed to pick me up and take me to Naples in
exchange for a fee. I’ve got my gear packed in the storage room.” Cristian
glanced at the old analog clock on the wall. “I’ve got to be at the Marina
Piccola an hour from now.”

“What? Were you just going to leave without a word?” Bruno
got to his feet. “When were you going to say something?”