Deluge: The Conqueror Worms II

CHAPTER 32

They all recognized the voice. No matter how faint or distorted, it was always the same guy—Mark from Boston, the world’s last disc jockey, broadcasting from atop the Prudential Building in beautiful, flooded downtown Boston. According to Novak, they’d first picked up his transmissions while sailing overtop Illinois. The man had rigged up his own pirate radio station. He’d described it in one of his previous broadcasts. Gail hadn’t understood most of the technical specifics, but apparently, the roof of the building was equipped with an array of radio masts and satellite dishes that allowed Mark to transmit to anyone in the world who still had a working radio, CB or television set. He’d also recently routed one of the dishes into the public broadcast system equipment, so that he could broadcast even further.

The only drawback, according to him, was that he couldn’t receive communications. He could only transmit, and had no way of knowing for sure if anyone could hear him. To Gail, that was the most frustrating part. She wished there was some way to reach him, some method of letting him know that he wasn’t alone, and that there were survivors out here aware of his plight.

“I always figured that if I was going to bite the big one,” Mark said, “I’d go out with a fight, like Willem Defoe in Platoon. I’m a sucker for those great last stands. But now, I don’t know. I doubt it will happen like that. This shit is spreading.”

“He’s got the fuzz,” Mylon said. “Poor bastard’s infected with that white shit.”

Gail, Paris and Lynn all hushed him, and the group turned their attention back to the overhead speakers.

“Anyway,” Mark continued, “this is day two of my broadcast and nobody has shown up to rescue us yet. My name’s Mark Sylva. If anybody is listening, we’re on top of the Prudential Building in Boston. We’re sick. Boston is underwater, except for us and another building. I keep thinking about my wife and son in Ohio. I just hope things are better there.”

“They’re not,” Novak muttered.

“Everybody’s acting weird, and we’re all so lethargic and thirsty. It seems strange, being so thirsty with all the water outside. I hope help comes soon. Otherwise, I think some bad shit is about to go down.”

McCann nudged Gail with his elbow. “You ready?”

She shrugged, then nodded. “Let’s get it over with.”

The two of them left the galley and shut the hatch behind them. Then they walked down the passageway towards the berthing area. Mark in Boston’s voice followed them, echoing out of each overhead speaker.

“The rash is getting worse,” he said. “I think I know what it is now. I don’t want to admit it to myself, but yeah, what the hell else could it be? I think we’re all infected.”

“Mylon’s right,” McCann said. “Sounds like the poor bastard is infected with the fungus.”

“We need to learn more about it,” Gail said. “Find out how it spreads. How to avoid infection. We know that you can get it by touching something that’s already infected, but there has to be more to it than that.”

“Yeah, but how are we going to find out? That’s a job for scientists in a lab somewhere—not a bunch of castaways on a boat. I mean, what kind of research team would we make, Gail? Mylon was a bus driver. Warren sold cars. Lynn worked for a health insurance company. Me and Riffle and Novak—all we know is this boat. I don’t know about any of the others, but none of them strike me as the scientist type. We’re just spitting in the wind, here.”

“You sound like you’re ready to give up. How about it, McCann? Do you agree with what Novak said in there? Do you think we should just…” She choked, unable to finish the sentence.

“Quit while we’re ahead? I don’t know. I don’t think I’d have the balls to kill myself, and I don’t think I could kill any of you, unless you were dying and in pain, or trying to attack me or one of the others. Except for Morgan, maybe. Him I could kill.”

He kept his expression serious for a moment, and then a toothy, mischievous grin slowly took its place.

Gail laughed. “Yeah, me too.”

“So what were you, before all of this?”

“Divorced,” Gail said. “No kids. I was a social worker. At night, I came home to my dog, a little Yorkie named Terrance.”

“And what happened to him?”

“We’re here,” Gail said, side-stepping the question.

They knelt by Hansen’s rack and opened his footlocker. They went through the items cautiously, double-checking for any sign of white fungus, but found none. There wasn’t much inside the footlocker. Some spare but damp clothes. A cell phone with a dead battery. Half a bottle of flax-seed oil capsules. A key ring in the shape of an apple which said ‘I ♥ NY’ with car and house keys dangling from it. And a black leather wallet. While McCann sorted through the items, Gail opened the wallet. It too was damp, and a faint musty smell rose from inside. She found a few mildewed snapshots—Hansen with two smiling children, obviously his, and a wedding photo of a much younger version of Hansen posing with his wife. Gail frowned, trying to remember if the man had ever mentioned his family, or what had happened to them.

“Did Hansen have a wedding ring?” she asked.

“I don’t know. I never noticed. To be honest, I didn’t like him very much. Why?”

“No reason. Just curious as to who he was.”

“Why? He’s gone, now. It’s not like we can carve this stuff on his tombstone.”

“Maybe not, but all the more reason we should know about each other, don’t you think? Somebody should remember us after we’re gone, don’t you think? A part of us should live on, even if it’s just somebody honoring the little things in our lives.”

“What about the soul?”

“Do you believe in a soul, McCann?”

“No. I mean, not anymore. I used to believe in God and Heaven and the immortality of the human soul, but I pretty much stopped believing around the time it started raining.”

Gail stared at the picture of Hansen and his kids and whispered, “Who were you, Hansen? What was the story of your life?”

“Does it matter?” McCann asked.

She closed the wallet and tossed it back into the footlocker. “No, I guess it doesn’t. Not anymore. Nothing really matters anymore.”

“Thirsty,” Mark’s voice echoed through the static. “Think I’ll lie down for a bit. I’m exhausted, and this cot is so… soft…”