Then There Were None
BY
Annie Walsh
I should have known from the news sources, right? It was almost a classic movie plot. After all how many disaster books and movies have I read and watched? They all start out bad then get ten times worse. A volcano erupts spewing ash loaded with spores and a meteorite flies right through the clouds igniting into a fireball that could be seen over four states. How pathetically cliché is that? Life sucks, you die, then you get back the fuck up, rotting all the while. BUT that's not the worst of it folks. Oh no. You want to eat you family, friends and anyone else you can get your stinking, rotting, infectious teeth in. That's the really kicker. The real fuckaroo party stopper as one of my favorite authors might put it.
We, humanity that is, seem to revert back to caveman mentality when disaster strikes. Shining examples of heroics and determination are trumpeted about on all the news channels to inspire the masses. But seriously folks how many times do you see people rioting and looting after a major catastrophe ? All the time! Our town was no exception.
News channels breaking into regular programming on all the major channels were my first clue that things were going to hell quick and we were right at ground zero. Why were we ground zero in St. Louis and not where the volcano actually erupted? I have no frickin' clue and apparently no one else did either.
It was probably 4 or 5 o'clock so I thought it was a regular newscast or even a commercial about a new movie. It was damn clear though soon that it was a situation that was screwed six ways to Sunday and getting worse by the second.
"This is Katie Kross , News channel 2. reporting from downtown St. Louis and St. Louis University Hospital. There is a hostage stand-off in progress as far as I can tell, Tim, happening right now!"
I could see a S.W.A.T. Van pulled up almost blocking the emergency room entrance and various police putting sawhorses across the sidewalk to block gawkers and trying to push the news crews back.
"Katie can you get some information from the people trying to leave the scene?" the anchor asked.
"I'll see Tim," she swooped down. "Ma'am? Ma'am." I could see the news woman trying to get the attention of a woman in bloodied pink scrubs sitting on the curb with her face in her hands.
She shoved the microphone in her face. "Can I ask you what happened in there? What does the gunman want? What's your name, ma'am?" The woman, her face pale and shocky, looked up.
"What, wha?". " My name is Lisa. It's on my tag. She held her forearm against her chest, her hand clenched over an open wound oozing blood down her chest and unto the ground. She spoke haltingly obviously traumatized by whatever experience she'd witnessed inside.
She spoke haltingly. "I don't know why he did this! He came in with a patient who was injured in what we originally thought was an animal attack!"
"Did he make any demands? How did the situation get so out of hand?" Katie pressed the injured nurse.
The woman coughed, almost gagging. "God my arm; he bit my goddamn arm!" She shoved it almost in Katie's face. Katie flinched back but kept the microphone in her face. The nurse had tears running down her face, smearing the blood that streaked her cheeks and neck. She almost robotically started repeating the medical statistics of the patient she'd been working on, and it seemed to calm her slightly.
" The gunman came in with a black male, approximately 15 to 17 years old with extensive damage to the left side of his face. He also had what appeared to be bite marks on the right arm ranging from the bicep to the lower ulnar area. He was missing the index and ring finger of the left hand and had deep, ragged puncture wounds with deep scratches circling his left forearm completely." Katie listened to this recital wide eyed. "His left clavicle had bite marks and his respiration was shallow and pulse thready. His temperature was actually lower than normal which in serious shock cases can occur."
"We attempted to remove his friend and that's when the patient began to seizure and foam at the mouth!" Lisa shuddered and sobbed. "HE DIED! He was in serious condition but he just.....died! I saw him die!"
Lisa took a deep breathe almost screamed, "THEN he sat up! He bit me. Look at this! And that's when his friend pulled a gun from somewhere and shot him in the chest! AND he kept trying to get up. That's when security came in and they shot the patient in the head. He FELL back and lay there but he was dead before that, don't you see..."
She grabbed Katie's wrist before she could pull away, spattering blood across her Gucci, pink ruffled blouse and into a cut she had covered on her wrist but exposed on camera when she grabbed here. As Katie frantically tried to wipe away the blood the nurse stood up and cried, " I can't be here! I need to leave. She leaned over and threw up into the gutter. As katie frantically back pedaled away from the vomit steaming in the gutter the nurse said, "I have kids! I have to go home!" She staggered out into the street almost as if she were drunk.