Two Minutes
In 2020 a global pandemic took thousands of lives and left millions devastated across the globe. It began in the Orient and did not stop until it had traversed the globe and circled back. It vanished as suddenly as it had appeared – or so it seemed.
Six months after the last Covid-19 detention centres were shut down and social distancing protocols revoked, Patient Zero was discovered in a village in Northern Punjab. Medical practitioners in the locality lacked the training and containment never crossed their minds. As he was being released from the local clinic with antibiotics that would only exacerbate the progress of the disease, more cases began popping up in rural communities across Punjab and the southern regions of the country. As the disease metastasized, our Patient Zero began to show changes in behaviour and appetite, and within days he had transformed into what the mainstream media called a ‘zombie’ – patient appeared to be dead with the cessation of heartbeat and breathing but retained visual acuity, motor functions, and an olfactory sense that activated in the presence of a live human specimen. Without proper protocols in place, it took mere days for the disease to spread across the country, incinerating infrastructure, destroying agricultural stores and toppling the government.
Four years have passed. Few survivors remain, living in small groups or in isolation in whatever shelter they can find. This is the story of one.
Her mother was shouting and banging on the table. She didn’t understand what was happening, or what her mother was saying. The banging got louder as her mother’s hand slapped the table repeatedly. The teacup, placed so close to the edge, shuddered as it neared the precipice and with another bang on the table fell to a shattering death.
It was the glass shattering that finally woke Zeen. Panic was already building in her chest. Noise was bad. Very bad. And too much of it was coming from the front of the bookstore that had been her shelter for the past ten days. Getting to her feet, she walked out of the corner alcove where she had been sleeping, surrounded by murder mysteries, and timidly picked her way through an aisle of children’s books. Nearing the glass front of the shop, she saw a woman banging on the inner glass doors of the shop. How did she get through the outer doors? She had barricaded herself in the vestibule between the two entryways. Zeen, still carefully hidden in the shadows, saw at least ten stalkers pressed up against the outer doors, which were held shut by what seemed like… Was that a dupatta?
There didn’t seem to be any broken glass in the entryway or within the front of the window, which was all glass. So where had the shattering sound come from?
The noise was attracting more zombies and a horde was beginning to form. Zeen knew the glass front of the shop would not hold long under the weight of so many dead bodies. She rushed to the door and began to pull at the chain that had been tied around the handles by a previous tenant. She had come through the storage area door at the back, now barricaded with boxes of books, and the chain had added to her sense of safety.
She saw hope on the woman’s face as she started to chant prayers of thankfulness. The chain was too tightly wound and Zeen was still working on a weird loop when she heard glass shattering again. Her fingers stopped working, frozen in place as she saw the woman’s tragic end unfold before her eyes. One of the outer doors cracked, and part of it fell forward, slicing away a chunk of flesh from the woman’s right arm. Zeen watched the kohl smeared eyes grow wide and wild, pierced nostrils flare – the gold nosering glinting in the afternoon sun, and the woman’s lips part wide as she prepared to scream. The sound never came. Or maybe it did. Zeen was too overwhelmed by the visuals to register anything else. Her hands lay frozen on the chain that held together the only barrier that could protect her as she watched the stalkers reach for the woman through the newly created gap. The fresh edge glass door that still stood wedged into putrid stalker flesh but they took no notice of it. One of the stalkers got hold of the woman’s plait who was already in shock because of her arm. Zeen was hopeful for her, she wouldn’t last long and her ordeal would be short. But she saw the face of the woman as she fell back, dragged by her hair, into the arms of the horde, as they buried their teeth in her caramel flesh, tore away bits of her, flinging drop of blood every which way. Zeen stood there and watched the woman’s head roll back as if in ecstasy as she was consumed by the horde. The scene lasted barely two minutes. Two minutes for an adult woman with caramel-coloured skin and black hair to disappear in a sea of teeth and decaying flesh.
With the last sight of the woman’s head, Zeen’s mental faculties rebooted and she knew she had to return to the shadows before the stalkers caught her scent. Or worse, saw her. But looking at her hands, she saw the chain had almost gotten free.
Two minutes, the thought kept whirring in her brain.
She had been alone long before she took refuge here. She had run out of food and only the last sips of water remained.
Two minutes. She tried to think happy thoughts. Tried to remember her life before the stalkers, having razed villages to the ground, headed to the urban centres. Tried to think of her friends, her family, her cat – but they were all dead.
Two minutes, her fingers gripped the chain again.
Two minutes.
Two minutes.
But where had the shattering sound come from?
Two minutes.
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