“Let the end of the world be inside you, then you don’t need to fear the end of the world out there.”- Eckhart Tolle

  A dreamless sleep lifted itself and Malcolm stared into the bottom of the empty, top bunk. Once he was certain he’d returned to the present day, Malcolm’s limbs felt envigored. There was an irritating itch on his chin and he scratched a solid patch of unshaven beard rustling beneath his fingers. In confusion, Malcolm rose from the bed and crossed to his smartphone on the desk.

  Malcolm looked at his own reflected image from the phone’s screen. Indeed, he had been neglecting to shave. The top screen also confirmed that cellular services were still down.

  He lo oked to the adjacent bunk and saw no sign of Liam; even the covers were made perfectly. Malcolm activated the screen and noticed the time was 5:15 pm. More peculiar was the date being the Tenth of May.

  These gaps coincide with my depictions. There’s not a body...yet.

  Malcolm set the phone down and began to check himself for signs of blood. Suddenly a knock came at the door and a voice bellowed through. “People are missing you, major.”

  Malcolm opened the hatch to both Lieutenant Kenneth Johnson and Markus Beauregard as one was mid-knock.

  “Ahh there you are!” Johnson uttered. “I know you aren't celebrating being alive in the same hole you get cooped in!”

  Beauregard leaned against the frame with a lit cigar. “The grunts have been missing their leader, Major Space Dog. Need I remind you that people’s spirits need buoying?”

  Johnson gave a cocky grin. “Yea, don’t want to be the only officer on the ship who didn’t blow off steam, do you?”

  Malcolm rubbed his eyes. “What the fuck are you two going on about?”

  They both looked at each other, Johnson spoke. “This fucker right here! Trying to stick people up after all that strong arming the brass!”

  Beauregard took a drag. “Not like he had to do much after that, we all pitched in once the permission was given.”

  “Permission for what?!” Malcolm demanded.

  “The End of the World Bash!” Johnson guffawed as he drew a cigar for himself.

  “It’s all thanks to you, Major. So don’t pretend to be humble now; even the Navy brats are joining in.” Beauregard stated.

  Malcolm stood with a hung mouth. “Where?”

  “Mostly the mess halls but we cleared room on the deck as well!” Johnson lit his cigar. “Come we show you the way.”

  Malcolm flashed his hands. “Hold on, I just woke up…” He began to check his pockets for his cigarette pack. When he pulled it out and opened it, Beauregard flashed a fresh cigar tube.

  “You’re wasting the buzz on a cig. It’s called a party sir.”

  Malcolm took the tube and checked its label. “Cuban? How?”

  Beauregard shrugged. “Well, if it’s to believed, the schmucks are outbreak-free for now.”

  Malcolm pocketed the tube and still opted for a cigarette. “I’ll save it for later.”

  Beauregard lit Malcolm’s cigarette for him. “Let’s go then. You’re the man of the hour.”

  The Lieutenants led Malcolm into the ship mess hall where they were beset on all sides by crowds in army green or navy blue. Everywhere they looked, cafeteria tables had been folded to the hall’s sides; spare tables lined the area beside the kitchen for soldiers to sit and eat. To the hall’s far left, the grunts had assembled a set of speakers around a designated DJ who was selecting playlists at random and taking requests.

  Every crowd around the door took notice and cheered at Malcolm’s entrance. Everyone began a chant, “SPACE DOG! SPACE DOG! SPACE DOG!”

  Johnson wrapped an arm around Malcolm while waving the crowds down. “CALM CALM! Our boy might take you for a Berserker!”

  Everyone laughed. The lights from the DJ were blaring all spectrums in the dark of the Mess Hall as Johnson and Beauregard brought Malcolm over to their round table near the kitchen entrance.

  Sitting at the table was Lieutenant Clairet and her platoon leaders along with Lieutenant Jason ‘No-Nut McGee’ Price. He had Caleb ‘Bullet Tarry’ Garth, Sergeant Hannah ‘Slit-Wrist’ Nichols, and Alan ‘Da Cow’ Williams. Johnson sat Malcolm at the two free seats while Beauregard circled to his.

  “The man of the night graces us! Where the fuck are our drinks?” Johnson asked.

  “Don’t take forever and we might save your beer next time.” Clairet belched.

  “Well, this won’t fucking do! We’re courting the guest of honor over here! Garth! Go get us a round from the kegger! Just bring the whole fucking keg.” Johnson waved.

  “Fuck yourself.” Garth responded. “I drank my share, make McGee do it.”

  “Officers are pulling rank buddy!”

  Garth guffawed. “I just got promoted a squad and a medal!”

  “Still a low rank.” Johnson was smug. “I took my licks when I was in your shoes, now it’s time for me to do the licking!”

  “My tip or my shaft?” Garth asked coyly. “Take your pick.”

  “Dont get combative Garth.” Malcolm raised his hands. “I’ll grab it with him.”

  Kenneth waved. “No! Service comes to prime dude of the night!”

  “Garth’s not a butler, Fuckaroo.” Malcolm stood.

  ‘Bullet Tarry’ Garth shrugged and stood, bringing Malcolm into the kitchen. They split up; Malcolm got a simple bowl filled to the brim with a beef stew mixed with his mash potato serving. He found Garth standing in a line for one of the kegs, they were lined and stacked against the wall.

  Malcolm cut over to Garth and not a soul dared to call him out for cutting in line; except a private standing behind Garth who dropped his chin with shame after seeing Malcolm. Garth was cutting a look between the two. “It’s funny how people around here fear people while respecting.”

  “People knew not to fuck with me as early as my Marine tenure.”

  Garth glanced at him with a smirk. “Well, that stunt you pulled while we were hustling back in Camp Stanley earned yourself some new points with the boys.”

  “The whole thing earned me a promotion.”

  “You got me one too,” Garth stated. “And I’ve been capped since my bullet tarry incident; so, I thank you for that.”

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  Malcolm was humble. “You earned that yourself. My report did nothing.”

  “My man in charge leads from the front. All the inspiration I needed.” Garth was finally next in line; he stepped forward and effortlessly lifted a fresh keg in between the two servers. They wanted to protest but uttered no words with Malcolm in sight. With the keg hoisted over his shoulder, Garth and Malcolm walked back to their table. Bullet Tarry set the keg beside the table and took his seat, as did Malcolm.

  “Welp, that’s perfect!” Stated Fuckaroo Jack.

  Clairet and McGee were already filling their paper cups as they passed Malcolm a filled one. “So how have you lads been since quarantine ended?” he asked.

  Everyone looked at each other.

  “Uh look, humbling yourself is great and all. But you speak like we just met each other.” Jack responded.

  “Did you split your head open?” Clairet asked sardonically.

  “No, I’ve just been doing a morale count. Why do you think I’m allowing all this?” Malcolm said.

  “Not because we earned it?” asked Johnson.

  Malcolm stared as he chewed. “I’ll indulge you and say yes. Even though we did what we signed up for.”

  Everyone stared at each other.

  “We signed up to fight the cannibal plague?” someone asked.

  Malcolm feigned a wince. “Far from what we’d consider traditional warfare, yes. But armies since time immemorial have existed to protect and enforce order and peace. Unless you want to be living in year zero, that applies to our Berserker Blight.”

  “So...” Johnson was tapping the table impatiently. “...What are the rules of warfare against the Berserkers?” Johnson asked.

  “For one thing, if we run, they swarm, and we all die.” Malcolm nodded.

  “Not much the optimist today, are we?”

  Malcolm continued. “At the same time, traditional terror tactics don’t work against the Living Dead.”

  “Can we not call them that?” McGee asked.

  “Why not?” Garth asked. “It’s what they are.”

  “I’ve seen what happens when we stand and face them,” Clairet declared. “We get swarmed anyway!”

  “We were fighting them as if they were an army, unfortunately you can’t shock and awe the Dead. That’s why everything went wrong on the peninsula.” Malcolm answered.

  A soldier spoke up. “So, what are we doing in Seattle?”

  “We’re quartering off society from the chaos.” Malcolm took his first gulp of beer. “The brass is resigned to half the country getting abandoned, and so should we; because we’re facing an unprecedented event.”

  “That’s it?” Nichols asked. “We fortify Seattle and hunker down?”

  “It's sad, but true, that the Naegleria Flu will have to run its course now that it is a pandemic. Until the Flu runs its course, and the geeks invent a vaccine, it’s all we can do.”

  “So, what does that mean for us?”

  Malcolm contemplated for a moment. “By rights, that makes the city ours only America doesn’t gift land to its military like the Romans did. So, it will belong to the people we protect; the politicians, scientists and businessmen, people who will never see the Undead if we do our jobs right.”

  “Then we’re just a shield wall for a bunch of privileged pricks?” Johnson asked.

  Malcolm shook his head. “No. The Wall is the wall and we’re in the battlements. We’re already important to the post-plague establishment. Now...Imagine a situation where we’ve already chosen which of the civilians is more important than the gas station schmuck. The people we abandon will have two choices, die by teeth, or overtake the barricades and die by gunshot...Our choices are to let everyone in and violate the quarantine or save a few to save everything. The only way we can do that is to treat every citizen as expendable. Hear me?”

  Johnson and Garth nodded. Everyone else at the table hesitated.

  “We’re to gun down American refugees?” Clairet asked with crossed arms.

  “Look at them as infected in waiting. If things get worse out there, everybody we keep out will get bitten. Next thing you know, the number of Berserkers has doubled. No good for our purposes...” Malcolm glared at the table. “Kill them now so we don’t kill them later.”

  “Is every quarantine center going to do this?” asked McGee.

  “...Sooner or later, they will. That’s why I’m giving you all the warning before we land. I’m also informing you that it’s why they aren’t sending us back our home states; can’t have us defecting if it’s our families outside those walls.”

  The group absorbed Malcolm’s words in a numb, foreboding silence.

  “...Can I count on all of you?” Malcolm asked.

  “It’s no different than the infected in the tunnel.” Garth uttered.

  Malcolm nodded. “All you can do is what’s necessary.”

  Out the corner of Malcolm’s eye, Liam emerged from the kitchen with a cigarette in his mouth. Malcolm’s eyes followed Liam as he circled the table and sat to his right. Malcolm stared with buggy eyes as Liam inhaled the smoke deeply. He leaned his head back and compressed a single cough before venting the smoke out his nose.

  Liam opened his eyes to Malcolm’s stare as he put the cigarette out. “Don’t you fucking acknowledge it.”

  Malcolm smiled. “Glad to see you can succumb to vices like the rest of us.”

  “Never claimed I can’t.” Liam was smug. “I’m just a self-appointed morale officer.”

  “You gonna pass one sir?” asked a platoon sergeant.

  “Sure.” Liam spoke; Malcolm approved with a nod. The table group continued talking about their shared combat experience against the Berserkers. Liam then handed the cigarette past Malcolm and closed the pack without offering one.

  “What?” Malcolm said. “Aren’t I here?”

  Liam smiled. “That you are Malcolm.”

  “So, you selectively sharing?”

  “And waste the buzz you could get on that cigar? Let’s see it.”

  Malcolm pulled out the tube and passed it to Liam, who flashed it above the table.

  “Oooo. Fancy Major?” Clairet asked.

  Liam stared into the brown tube’s reflected light. “It’s Cuban. Should last the night. They should last the pandemic from what I hear.” Liam looked back at Malcolm as he drew a lighter. “Word has it that blockade around Cuba has been turned outward, making these all the more valuable to the world.” He took a deep first puff of the perfect roll and spoke under the exhumed smoke.

  Liam looked at Malcolm as he passed the cigar, Malcolm pondered as he tapped the first bit of ash off. “...Everything will change for them radically, as it will for the world…but that doesn’t change one thing. What we do will matter, because on the Seattle walls, we stand against the Undead.”

  A random grunt arrived with a round of shots from the kitchen. One was passed for all at the table, save for Malcolm. Liam passed Malcolm his drink as Malcolm exchanged the cigar.

  Liam puffed and continued, “But it’s more than battlements and badges that bind us together. You know the bonds that come from shared experiences: We saw the eve of the Berserker Plague and depended on each other to survive the night; we stood witness to the firebombing of Korea and shared the collective guilt for what we had to do...

  ...That shared trauma makes us a greater whole than any game winning touchdown. And when we can finally see our families again, I’ll be the one to mail you these cigars every anniversary of the victory date.” Liam soaked the admiration of the table with another puff of a cigar.

  Malcolm, having drank half of his keg beer, took the cigar back with a nod. Malcolm’s drag of smoke was contemplative. “But remember that bond doesn’t reach the brass, who will stick us to the wolves when push comes to shove. They’ll tell us what we want to hear about the home front then they’ll most certainly shoot us if we defect to our families.

  We have a responsibility to act in the face of incompetence when the Dead are walking.”

  Liam began to pat Malcolm on the shoulder. “Calm now Malcolm. Let’s end on a high note.”

  Malcolm nodded and downed another sip of his beer. He looked at the faces of the table, all shared varying degrees of acknowledgement. Finally, the swell of nicotine and alcohol began to dilute Malcolm’s wake as a head rush dizzied him.

  Malcolm’s vision returned him to a nearly empty table. He looked in his hands for the cigar which was gone. He turned his head in any direction for Liam and saw only the seas of crowds beneath flashing lights.

  Malcolm stood and found himself drawn further onto the dance floor. He weaved around moving figures who took no notice of him. Finally, he saw Liam dancing with Clairet.

  They swayed to the rhythm of a Scars of Broadway single and had the amplified energy of animals on drugs. Between Liam’ fingers the cigar was cupped, and he brought it in for a long drag, after exhuming the smoke, he pulled Clairet in for the end song crescendo.

  “…I fall in love with the Old Times…

  …I never mention my own mind…

  …Let’s fuck the world with all its trend…

  …Thank God it’s all about to End…”

  As Liam and Clairet kissed and joined the beat as one, Liam’s eye caught Malcolm. He grinned as if everything would be alright.