A split second after she landed, she felt droplets, hitting against her hands like rain. Only it wasn’t rain, it was blood and debris.
She sat up and everything spun. Her eyes rolled back causing vertigo to strike temporarily.
Was she hurt? She didn’t know. It was hard to assess. She tried to focus, but things shifted out of control, rolling from her vision as if she were drunk. Her hands moved on the ground, feeling her way around and her fingers hit something.
Looking down she saw it was an arm with a hand attached, a hand still holding a microphone.
All around her were body parts. Arms, legs, heads. It was a bloodbath. Parts of the store were strewn across the street, mixed with food items.
People screamed, but they were drowned out by the constant ringing in her ears.
It gave it a very surreal, dream like feel.
Fen tried to get her bearings, get it together. Giving it one more attempt to stand, she peered up and when she did, she saw the little boy still across the road. Again, he smiled at her and then he ran off.
Fen wanted to scream out in frustration, how could she be that stupid? How did she not see the explosion coming? She bent her legs, got her footing, attempted to stand, but a pain shot through her hip and she buckled back down.
You’re weak. You’re weak, she told herself. Get up. Be strong.
After one more attempt, she succeeded. More than anything she wanted to chase down the boy, but she couldn’t. She’d have to order someone else to do it. Fen had to get it together, get her balance and take care of the situation at hand. A deadly situation she didn’t see coming because she never expected it to happen.
An error she wouldn’t make again.
Caldwell, OH
The military phone was placed right where Troy had said it would be. In the feminine protection disposal box in the third stall of the old McDonald’s. Cal wondered how in the world he would explain not only what he was doing in an old McDonald’s, let alone the women’s room. Sure enough, like everyone else, Cal was given light janitorial duty in the mess hall. Which was… McDonald’s. He was to do that, stay busy until they found him more of a permanent job.
Because he wasn’t American he had a different status there.
They didn’t search him like they did others. He was able to conceal that phone in the waist of his pants.
He rested after he had arrived at Caldwell, and they gave him some sort of medication that actually made him feel much more energized.
Almost everyone had a job. A lot of the detainees were working at the Walmart cleaning shelves, packing items, and accounting for them. Cal had a bunk in a tent set up in the Walmart parking lot. But only those fully trusted or who weren’t American weren’t under lock and key after work hours.
There were two living areas.
For refugees, who were more like detainees, hundreds of tents, campers, and box houses were set up in a large fenced-in area within a fenced-in area that extended over the highway toward the prison. Once the detainees were allotted evening exercise in the free area yard they were placed in lockdown in their tents.
The Nobel Correction facility was the other living area, for those who were labeled prisoners of war. Those people didn’t have jobs nor were they inside the actual prison. They slept like animals, outside, on blankets. The night before there was rain and the hundred or so of them huddled against the building to stay dry.
He hadn’t the chance to speak to anyone yet, but Cal observed the routines as best as he could.
Refugees were treated more humane. As they filed out of their tents in the morning, they were given a protein bar, water and released to work. During the guard change in the afternoon, they were lined up, given a meager meal, and placed in the free area to eat and walk around. After an hour they returned to work until sun down. Same routine, a meager meal, and yard time. Only they were allowed to use the portable showers set up against the fence. The lines were so long many didn’t get the chance to wash.
For the prisoners, it was different.
They were fed once a day and done trough style. The water in one, a slop in another. It was degrading.
Cal was fortunate. He and eight others ate in the mess hall after the soldiers were finished with their meals. He had fresh coffee as well.
He did wonder what the reasoning was that he had to put down he was an architect, considering his first two days he was scrubbing toilets.
A twinge of guilt struck him when he sat down with his lunch. His food was fitting and smelled good. It was some sort of beef with lots of vegetables and rice.
He was eating well, while others were not. When he was just about finished, a small laptop computer was placed in front of him, then a man in a button-down shirt sat across. He was one of the Chinese project supervisors. Those not military but had come over to aid in running things.
“Mr. Calhoun,” he said in English but with a dialect.
“Yes.”
“I have received word that news of your exchange to your homeland will arrive sooner than we believed.”
“That’s great news, thank you,” Cal said.
“In the meantime, this job of cleaning is temporary, but we have heard you are very brave.”
“Me? Brave? I don’t think so.”
“You wandered the roads, faced radiation and scavengers all to try to make it to us and make it home. One of my soldiers has told me.”
Cal wondered what soldier it was. One of the official soldiers or the Chinese American posing as one.
“Thank you,” Cal said.
“We have a job that we need a man of your intellect and bravery.”
It sounded big and important. Something that Troy would probably have screamed at him to accept.
“We have been lax and are far behind.” He pushed the laptop to Cal. “We need to register every single refugee and prisoner in this camp.” He flipped open the laptop. “The program is already available. You need to merely start logging them in. Can we ask that of you?”
Cal eyed the software, it looked easy enough. “Can I ask why you won’t send one of your men to do this?”
“Because they need to go into the secure perimeter of the prison and refugee camp.”
“Ah, they would have to be locked in,” Cal said.
“It is safer for you than them.”
What choice did Cal have? He agreed and after he was done with his lunch, he was taken by jeep the one mile to the Nobel correction facility where he was escorted into the fenced-in yard.
The guards carried a table and chair, set it up by the gate, then left.
Cal had previously been given instructions to interview as many as he could until the bell rung.
Once his table was set, no one bothered to look his way.
Cal stood and using a loud voice announced, “I am here like you are. Detained. I am taking names and information and putting it in a database so your families can find you. I know you don’t want to but I ask that you do this. Or how else will anyone know what has become of you?”
“Are they really gonna let our families know?” someone shouted.
Cal shrugged. “No. Your families would have to seek you out. They have set up refugee search centers two hours every day in certain towns. They can check the database but if you aren’t in it, they won’t know.” He waited for another question but one never came, and Cal took his seat at the folding table and propped open the laptop.
It didn’t take long for the line to form. Cal glanced up to the first person in line. A young man, thin and frail who looked as if he was in need of medical attention.
“Name?” Cal asked.
“Tobias. Or rather,” he said, “Toby. Toby Garbino.”