Chapter 2

Civilization Reboot

I was never in on creating one of those new bastions of civilization. It took me too long to get the hell out of Washington, D. C. I was in downtown DC on that day, scheduled to be a talking head on Fox and to give a speech at the American Enterprise Institute. It was a freezing morning, one of those mornings I was cursing Al Gore and sarcastically muttering, "It's that damn global warming," every time someone complained about the temperature. Fox had me outside the Capitol since I was also there to whisper enlightenment in a couple of Congressmen's ears, seeing as they had been smart enough to come to me and admit their ignorance. I verbally sparred with some minor minion of the Democratic Party and a flunky of the Senate Minority Leader's office before heading for Seventeenth Street and the AEI office building I was speaking at. I stopped in a pizza place for lunch before I got there and was watching the White House Press Secretary eat the press corps on t. v. when my cell phone went off. I was watching in horror as a couple of friends were being munched by someone I used to sneeringly refer to as "the most arrogant moron to ever serve any President." The media were already in a panic over Atlanta and Ft. Detrick, but this was DC! This was the White House! I got out of the pizza place just as all hell broke loose in downtown Washington. Taking stock of things and seeing the chaos beginning, I decided getting the hell out of Dodge would be a good thing to do. Looking around, I saw a delivery bike for the pizza place lying on the ground outside the restaurant and grabbed it, pedaling away at top speed for my apartment.

I did not get far before I realized the shit was hitting the fan. I actually saw the HUD Secretary running down the street towards me when I picked the first tallish building I could see (buildings on and around the Mall not being very tall) and decided the roof of said edifice would be a good place to reconnoiter and think. I didn't really know what agency used the building, but there was mass panic inside when I threw the bike down outside and ran in. I dodged several women in full panic mode and hit the first stairwell I could find, running all the way to the top. I was somewhere not far from the White House and Capitol, my apartment being only minutes from downtown and on the opposite side of the Mall from the pizza joint. I saw Marine One lifting off carrying who knows who, the President and the rest of the important people already supposedly safe at Camp David. Peering over the skyline of DC, smoke was visible from fires and car crashes and the sound of panic, terror, and death was already wafting on the air.

I died for the first time on that roof. I was crying and thinking about my sister in upstate New York and my brother in Marietta, outside of Atlanta, wondering if they and their rather large families were alright. And how long would they stay that way. I had never come close to marrying, being too wrapped up in my research and fast life in the know in DC. The thought of what would happen to us now wafted through my brain seconds before every joint and bone in my body began searing with pain. I think I remember screaming and feeling my clothes begin to grow tight as my skin joined in the burning. I fought to stay conscious simply for the fact that I was on a roof in the middle of a city of infected crazy people on a day when the Weather Channel had forecast a high of 19° F, but it was a losing battle.

I really don't know how long I was out, but I rejoined the world in a cramped sort of pain centered in my groin and arm pits and feet. The sun was still up and the wind was still brisk but I began noticing much more. The sun was too bright. The wind was too brisk and too loud. My clothes were too rough. The sound of the city made my eardrums vibrate so hard I could feel them. I clapped my hands to my ears and almost yelped at the sharpness of my beard. My beard? I thought, as my mind began settling down and filtering the sensory input. I rarely have to shave; I have so little facial hair. Where the hell did the beard come from? Squinting against the sun's brightness, I pushed myself up to a sitting position and knew something was off with my body. My feet were crammed into shoes that looked ten sizes too small and my pants were causing my reproductive organs considerable pain. The coat I was wearing was pinching my armpits and my shirt was in tatters, which made me wonder why I was not colder. That was answered by the abundance of chest hair now covering my torso, though not nearly thick enough to be called fur. My skin also felt ... not really sure how to describe it. I could feel the fat, but it was like a thin layer just under the skin covering seriously hard muscles that were definitely not there before I seized up and passed out. But it did not feel like fat, more like what I imagine dolphins and whales feel like. I felt heavy but I still moved with the same quickness that got me out of many a fight in middle school and got me on the soccer team in high school. I felt okay, now that I was fully awake. Better than okay.

It was as I was levering myself up to stand that I heard them coming up the stairs. Their heavy, almost labored breathing echoed loudly up the stairs and made me clap my hands back to my ears, despite the fact that the door was still closed and the noise on the roof was still pretty painful to my new senses. There was more than a little slavering in that breathing and I suddenly smelled that metallic tang that I now know is the minerals in blood. Being new to the use of my senses other than sight, I did not realize a lot of things they were trying to tell me. Given the general state of the city before I passed out, however, I decided to use a little caution and tried to hide. Especially since I was not really supposed to be up here.

I found an air vent, easily pulled it's cover off and stuffed myself into the tiny (for my new body) opening. Just as I was fitting the vent cover back on, the door onto the roof crashed open and violently ripped off its hinges. I heard heavy footfalls on the roof and the heavy, slavering breath of two people. Somehow, it came to me that it was a man and a woman who had come out onto the roof. Being the traditionalist that I am (or rather, was) I was an unconscious chauvinist. I thought that since there was a woman, it was safe. I was taught by my mother and father that you do not hit girls and you do not fear girls. Hence, girls are not a threat. And nothing in my personal experience had taught me different. I had a healthy respect for any female's ability to do whatever it was they wished to put their minds or hands to, but that did not include villainy or atrocities. It just did not occur to the chauvinistic mindset I had that equated all women, on first encounter, to either my mother or my sister or my nieces (depending on their age).

And so I ignored the reptilian part of the brain that controls our fear and our fight-or-flight instinct. The part of my brain that was causing the hairs on my neck to rise and my entire back to wriggle uncomfortably with goose bumps. The part that was telling me there was something very wrong. I popped the vent cover back off and stuck my head out just as the "woman" came around another vent to see me. I instantly knew I was in sooo much trouble. She ... well, think of a female version of the Hulk, only bronzed skin and black fur running down her arms and back with slime dripping from the corners of her mouth and teeth a shark would be envious of. She was wearing the blood-spattered remnants of a lavender stockings, garters, panties, and bra set, which would have been ludicrous if I was not sure I was about to be eaten as easily as the White House press corps had been. As soon as I locked gazes with her black orbs, she began breathing even more heavily and she gave out an almost motherly croon that shivered on my eardrums. A harsher growl answered her from the other direction and footsteps came around the vent on my other side.

Turning my head slowly, I saw something which made me even more afraid than Pin-Up She-Hulk. He looked like Conan the Barbarian, à la Arnold Schwarzenegger, right down to the hairless chest and long flowing brown locks. He was about seven and a half feet tall and seemed to have skin like mine, hard but with a layer of fat beneath to keep him warm, only his was covered in blood. He wore nothing, which told me whatever he had been doing downstairs to get all bloody had excited him immensely, despite the cold up here on the roof. He also had hands that seemed to have short claws on them; more really sharp fingernails that had been done in a nail salon. There were bits of skin and hair caught in those nails and he was looking at me and clenching his fingers, pale brown eyes feverishly bright. His breathing also picked up and he began drooling copiously. Behind me I heard her begin moving towards me and he did the same. I was so screwed and, like I said, not used to needing to use my fight-or-flight instincts. I froze. And I died.