Chapter 11: Willing to Try

It's been a month since Iliana went missing. Resources were scarce and no one was available that could help me. When I called the police station's number, I never got through. The phone just kept ringing and ringing. I thought they might have been busy given the high crime rate we suffered shortly after the chemical attack, but when I went out to the station in person, I saw that there were boards on the windows, making it look like an abandoned building. I was angry that the police had just up and left. Didn't they know that the citizens needed help?! Wouldn't they have anticipated a crime increase in a time of crisis and chaos? I punched the front door in anger and drove home, fuming. How the fuck was I supposed to find Iliana now?!

In the midst of me continually being frustrated over Iliana's disappearance, I continued to work at the hospital. Gunshot wounds were the most common injuries that I had to operate on. There have been fewer cases now that some time has passed and the looters have stopped. Now that there aren't as many surgeries I have to perform, I've been helping out around the other parts of the hospital because it's become overcrowded from the people who are still there from when the attack initially happened, and more people that have had side effects from the attack.

I make my way up the stairs amidst the hustle and bustle of the hospital to my office, where I hope to get some peace and quiet. I need like five minutes to clear my head so I can be useful again downstairs. When I open the door, I see a small frail woman sitting in one of the chairs in my office. Her hair is ratty and tangled, dull in color, and her clothes are very dirty. So much for getting some down time. 

I slowly close the door and take a deep breath, closing my eyes so I can ground myself before speaking to her. After I pull myself together, I walk over to my desk and sit down. The woman looks at me with her sunken in eyes and sad expression.

"Dr. McClaren?"

"Yes, that's me. How can I help you?"

"I think I'm sick from the attack. I keep throwing up, it's hard to breathe, and I can't get rid of this headache."

I wonder why this woman didn't go into the waiting room in the front of the hospital, which is on the first floor instead of coming all the way up here. I walk over to her and put my stethoscope on her chest and listen to her heart beat. It sounds weak and not necessarily irregular, but she's definitely not in good condition. I put her in a wheelchair and we go over to the elevator.

When we get downstairs, I put her on a stretcher and hook her up to an IV with saline solution. She looks very malnourished and I'm not surprised, considering the horrid quality of the rations we've been getting. I tell the woman to get some sleep and apologize that I don't have a room for her, but that she'll be fine where she is.

"CODE BLUE! Dr. McClaren, can you come here?! Room 117!"

I hear some other hospital staff yelling for help, and when I walk in, I see that this patient is the one who has been dying for about two weeks. He'd been hanging on to life, but had crashed two or three times already in those two weeks. I charged up the defibrillator and gave the man a charge. Nothing. I tried again, and still nothing. Two more times, and the heart monitor was still flat lining.

Sadly, I had to call time of death for him. He had been suffering from side effects of the chemical attack. He was nearby when the attack happened, not close enough to have the chemicals kill him instantly as he was a few blocks away, but he breathed enough in to have respiratory problems and eventually his organs started shutting down, one by one.

After work, I come home to my empty house once again. I feel so useless that I don't have any way to find Iliana. This must be how a police officer feels when they run out of leads. I don't think that I could ever do what they do. I turn the tv on and lay on the couch, trying to relax and get these thoughts of hopelessness out of my head, but usually after work is when I feel the most depressed, seeing all these people come in suffering from things that never would have been so common had the chemical attack not happened. I don't by any means hate my job, I love to help people recover their health, but it saddens me to see that so many people are unwell. It's especially sad when someone dies.

"Ever since officials have found the water treatment facility to be the main location of the chemical attack, they are urging citizens to only use the water to wash their face and hands. Local water has been deemed unsanitary for human consumption. Officials will be importing clean drinking water from overseas countries and sending them with weekly food rations. Please use this water carefully, as you do your food rations, so you don't run out of it before the next shipment comes in. Now, to our weather, Laura, you're up.

Okay, Tom, the skies still remain dry, with temp-"

I shut off the tv after listening to them blabbing on about water. I am glad they will be sending clean drinking water to us. Ugh, maybe I need to go for a run. I'm thinking back to when I used to go for early morning jogs, back before the attack happened. Ever since Iliana disappeared, I haven't been on one. Now that the air is no longer toxic, I suppose I could go on a short jog. Jogging always made me feel better, maybe it would still have that effect. I went into my bedroom and changed into a tank top and some athletic shorts, then opened the front door and started jogging.

The sky was a strange color as usual, it had gone from black to white. Either that or there was some stuff from the military's air filtration facility that was causing the sky to be that color. As I made my way to the park, I found myself slowing down a little and looking at how lackluster it looked, from the dead trees with their brown, dried out leaves, and the dry, brittle grass poking up sadly from the ground. I remember when the park used to be full of random people having picnics, or playing Frisbee, maybe even having a sing along, or a campfire.

"OW! Man, watch where the fuck you're going!"

Someone bumps into me and yells at me, maybe I bumped into them? I look past me, and see a man who I vaguely recognize. He looks pretty upset and is glaring at me.

"Whoa, I am so sorry, I was distracted. Are you all right?"

"Dr. McClaren?"

Hmm... he knows me as his doctor. I look at his brown hair and brown eyes, while trying to picture... I think when I knew him he didn't have the stubble, and he was wearing a hat. I operated on him! Back when he was on the force and he came in with a minor gunshot wound!

"Officer Belcourt?"

"Yeah, except now I'm not an officer anymore. Can you believe the military fucking closed the police station?!"

They closed the police station? I feel bad for getting upset earlier and thinking it was the police force's decision to shut down. I then find myself wondering why the military would close one of the most important departments in town. It's no wonder he's pissed, he got laid off. At least I have my job, even though my life is less than ideal at this moment.

"I found out the other day, I tried to go there to report a missing persons, but no one would answer the phone and so I went there in person... it was all boarded up. I'm so sorry that you lost your job."

"SHIT!"

All of a sudden, Officer Belcourt's eyes went big and he grabbed my arm briefly, beckoning me to follow him. I was unsure what was happening, but I figured his cop instinct was kicking in and he saw danger somehow nearby.

"What's going on?!"

I tried to catch up to Officer Belcourt, but he ran really fast, probably a side effect of him needing to be in top physical condition for his former job. I hoped I made it into the building before whatever dangerous thing consumed us. Luckily, I made it in just in time as I heard a loud rumbling in the sky, which signaled the start of an electrical storm. The sky was so unpredictable these days. I was glad Officer Belcourt was more aware of it then I was.

"Thank you for that, Officer Belcourt."

"Please, call me Francis. There's not really a need for formalities. I'm happy to help. Those electrical storms are nasty. It's just so hard to predict where the next lightning strike will land, so it's better to be inside till it passes. Anyway, you were saying, you found out the police station had been closed because someone you know is missing?"

"Yes. A few days after the attack, looters came into my house, shot me, and kidnapped my wife, Iliana. I haven't been able to do anything to figure out where she is. I think that they might have-"

My voice catches in my throat and I find it hard to talk when I get to the part where I remember the evidence I found that could only mean one thing. I naturally hung my head and rubbed my neck, trying to relieve the sudden onset tension that had crept up on me. After finding that the tension refused to disappear, I lowered my hands, and then the tension was replaced by extreme anger.

"They fucking raped her! Then they kidnapped her! I was unconscious for the whole damn thing and when I came to, she was just fucking gone! I don't even know what the fuck, like if she's dead or alive, trapped in someone's basement, being sold as a sex slave, I just, I can't-"

Tears start falling down my face uncontrollably. It's the first time I've ever voiced my concerns or what happened that night to another human being. It was difficult and I felt so helpless the entire time I was talking. I felt Francis come over and sit next to me. I felt somewhat stupid for telling him some of my more personal thoughts about the situation, but another part of me was okay with it because he was a police officer, still, in my eyes, so it seemed a little natural as well. I continued my angry rant, curving my fingers into a strangling position.

"If I ever find out who the fuck did this, I could fucking kill him."

I looked at Francis, and his eyes were filled with concern.

"Jesus Christ, Dr. McClaren. I am so sorry."

"Gerard. You can call me Gerard."

We sat there in silence for a few minutes, neither of us knowing what to say. I suppose I made things awkward, but I needed a friend, and Francis seemed like he cared. I didn't know if he could help me, but I was sure he was probably willing to try.