Prying open his broken door I shuffle into hisoffice, followed by a dozen reverent converts, and sift clumsilythrough his maps. I poured over them zealously as a kid, and I knowwhat I’m looking for. I order one of the converts to go looking forflashlights, since dad was always anal about having several on hand.He hated getting caught in the dark without one.It takes me longer than I’d hoped to find themap, but I wouldn’t trust the others to search for me. We leave theapartment, me in the lead, unrolling the aged paper and scanning forthe nearest entrance. It looks like there’s one not far from here,down on the street.When we arrive the convert with dad’s oldmanhole pick takes centre stage. With help from the rest of us heslams it home in a small notch in the concrete, and our combinedstrength lifts the manhole cover free. I wince at the clatteringbang, even though the army couldn’t possibly hear what we’redoing. I hand the map to one of the converts, a burly manwith half a face, and show him where to go with a shaky finger.“You’ll come up in the middle of their lines. Don’t chant whileyou’re walking, just keep quiet. And don’t drop this, or you’llget lost forever. Everybody got a flashlight?”A dozen hands rise. A nice, small, efficientstrike team. I hope it’s enough. I nod. “Good. Now remember,don’t cause a ruckus and don’t go overboard. Pick ‘em offslowly, if you can. I repeat, no chanting!”I motion for them to enter the manhole, and eachone gracelessly falls into the murky waters below after attempting touse the ladder. The only one to successfully get down is the man withthe map, which pleases me – they wouldn’t get far without him.I really hope this works.
Chapter 7It worked!It’s been months since the operation – don’task how many, the power’s been out for a while – and I can’tbelieve how fortunate we were. My converts, no more than a dozen menand women, managed to spread absolute anarchy throughout the militarylines with only a few hours of work. When the bulk of the convertsshowed up, they faced only confused resistance.Now we have guns. We don’t use the guns, sincewe can’t pull the triggers. We do like the helmets, though, sincethey keep us safe from easy headshots. Life is good. The savages have been pushed out ofthe city entirely, and the surrounding counties purged of speedy,distracting thoughts. By my reckoning there are millions of us now,spreading throughout the country, and I’m always at the front. It’simportant for a leader to stay with the troops. The general can’thide behind his men, it’s cowardly.Not that anybody would fault me. I’m the oldestof the converted, and so there’s not a hell of a lot left of me. Myremaining eye is still strong, but my legs are gone. One of them gotpeppered by a wily, machinegun-bearing country hick, and the otherjust fell off. The hick carries them both around for me, now, eventhough I’ve forgiven him.And me? Well, I’m just luggage. My converts taketurns strapping me to their backs. I tell them not to worry, to letme crawl, but they won’t listen. “The Balancing Point needs tostay higher than the rest,” they say. I don’t agree, but the dayfor actual balancing hasn’t come yet, so I don’t argue too much.I spend most of my time thinking, scheming tobring more and more savages into the fold. I don’t understand whythere’s so much resistance to the word we’re carrying, to themiracle of the bite. So many of them have changed; obviously there’sa reason to come over. But none of them listen, and in their finalmoments before being shown the truth of the teeth I can see theprimal fear in their twitching expressions. It makes me feel good toknow that they’re about to be slowed down, but at the same time Ihate that they need to feel so fearful.
But I soldier on. My cause is just. And becauseit’s just, I make a point of joining in the conversions regularly.There’s no keeping me off the front lines. My converts are happy tooblige, too, carrying me to each fresh assault on the savages for atleast a few bites. They think it’s an honour to let me bring myphilosophy the savages, as though doing so somehow creates strongerconverts.They’re making too much of me. I never receivedthis kind of attention as an IT tech, though, so I’d be lying if Isaid I didn’t enjoy it at least a bit.But all that is secondary right now! Whatinterests me at the moment is rapid expansion. I don’t get muchinformation about the other parts of the world, but as far as I knowthe word hasn’t spread too far past the confines of North America,and even here there are some rather determined pockets of resistanceagainst the truth. How do we circumvent these nasty blockades?Fortunately, moving beyond the constraints of thiscontinent isn’t as bad as it sounds. Though much of the region isin a state of lockdown, there are still airplanes moving back andforth. I’ve had more than a few converts sneak into airports – wecan be surprisingly sneaky when we want – and injure passengersbefore they go abroad, catching them in their overnight hotels. Thesoldiers guarding these places are surprisingly inattentive comparedto the airports themselves.But the air isn’t the best way to move away fromNorth America. No, our ideal route is across the sea! The movementhas spread to seaside communities in hundreds of places, and I’vehappily watched whole squads of converts sail off on long-termmissions to the other side of the world. They don’t need food orwater anymore, so distance isn’t a problem. Most of them considerit a vacation, as they can stare happily at the vast blue of theAtlantic Ocean for weeks on end before arriving.I envy them. I’ve never gone on a cruise before.Probably better than the cottage. And with this new philosophy,cruises must be more fun than ever.
But I can’t indulge in such luxuries, because,as usual, I need to stay here. I get to conduct occasional widespreadjoy rituals, true, but for the most part my brain is always active. Ihave to focus on the goal of making all those unhappy savages asgleeful as the rest of us. And when it comes to North America, thatmeans dealing with the second blockade to progress: military bases.My converts have been hard pressed to pierce mostof these installations. Unlike civilian posts they’re sealed tight,and the soldiers are content to shoot anything that comes within amile of their borders, convert and savage alike. There aren’t manyof them compared to our swelling numbers, but they don’t need manysoldiers to deal with us.At least we took out the air bases. Thank god wegot the air bases. Getting bombed is a horrific thought. It evenhappened, once, and we held a day long prayer vigil for the thousandsof converts lost. But they’ve been returned to the planet that theyso love, and we soldier on in their absence. By sheer numbers I thinkwe can succeed.That’s why I’ve come to watch the invasion ofan army base. I want to see these vicious savages brought low.They’ve earned my rage for their attacks, for their blindignorance, and I’ll love seeing them dragged, screaming, into thelight.But that will only happen if my plan works. Bigif.The base in question looks like an olderinstallation, built into a sweeping plain on the edges ofcivilization and surrounded by walls. The walls must be a recentaddition, or at the very least they’ve been reinforced with freshmortar and steel, ‘cause they look pretty fresh. The base is alsosurrounded on all sides by land mines, as some of my unlucky convertsdiscovered a few days ago, and the perimeter is constantly patrolledby armed soldiers with machine guns. The only reason they haven’topened fire, I assume, is because their ammunition stores arelimited.
The legions of converts surround the base. There’sover a million of us here. We could win with a simple, sustainedassault. That’s worked nicely in other places. But they weren’tas heavily defended as this base, and I’d lose a lot of converts inthe process. They haven’t had the chance to enjoy a world where thetaste for flesh doesn’t exist. I want as many as possible tostumble into that world.I motion to my carrier, and he hands me a walkietalkie. Tries, anyway. He drops it a few times. I don’t mind. I’dbe much worse in his place.Propping it against his rotting neck, I bash theon button with my forehead. It’s already set to the right channel,and crackles to life immediately. “Anybody home?” I askcheerfully.After a moment, a female voice answers. Not mygirl, sadly. She’s been dead for almost a month. “Copy that. HailThe Balancing Point.”“Yes, yes.” I chortle and shake my head. Ihate that name. “Are the packages ready?”“Yes, your lordship. And the savages are readyto do their part.”I hear snarls over the microphone, unintelligibleand frightened. Poor guy. He probably has no idea what’s happening.“Right. We’re in place, and the base is in a lull. Time todeliver the packages. Pass the word along.”“Copy that, your lordship. Forever bliss toyou.”“Forever bliss to you, too.” I let thetransceiver fall. I don’t need it anymore. I listen to the snapsand hisses of an unfocused channel, enjoying the simplicity ofthought they bring while I wait for the operation to begin.
Eventually, after an eternity of happythoughtlessness, a sound interrupts my reverie: a buzzing above andbeyond that of the walkie talkie. I strain my rotting ear to listen,and, surely enough, the buzzing turns into the rapid engines of apassing airplane.I look up. My neck pops, but I don’t care. Iwant to see. And what I spot is a good plan spirited on dull, greywings: a passing cargo transport, sailing smoothly towards the base.And another. And another. And... yep, there’s the last one.I can only imagine what the savages inside thebase are thinking. I have no doubt that they underestimate ourintelligence, that they think we’re just stupid brutes. Why elsewould they react with such brutish displays of force against myclever tactics, time and time again? This is just relief from theirallies, a delivery of much-needed supplies from friendly faces.Yeah, that’s what they think this is. I can seesoldiers cheering on the walls. Poor bastards.The planes swoop in low, keeping a safe distancefrom one another, and I assume their cargo bay doors open becausehuge crates start to fall out, carried safely on parachutes into thebase. It takes several minutes before the planes are out of sightagain, winging back to one of the air bases we captured in the lastmonth, where their unlucky, captured pilots will finally be shown thetrue way to live. I pray that the converts inside the crates won’tbreak too many limbs on the landing. I tried to pick fresher,stronger candidates for this campaign. “Get ready,” I yell. “You know the route.The main road to the front gate. They didn’t put mines on theroad.” The message is passed along the line, part of an echoingchorus that’s beautiful to my ears. Soon we’ll become a massivequeue, filing towards the breached base while the soldiers withindeal with my paratrooping kin.