The conference room had been designed so that it was in the northern wing of the hotel and it wouldn’t be so stifling hot here during summer meetings without air conditioning. The sun was up, and the light was sufficient in the room. But Andy did not want to think about the time when the sun would go down.
“Let’s hope the power outage is temporary,” Andy said.
A dark-complexioned man in his forties raised his hand, “Sir? Do you have a power generator in this facility?” He spoke in English with a heavy Turkish accent.
“Yes, right,” Andy said. “Actually, we do but we haven’t got it installed yet. They delivered it to us two weeks ago.”
“Well,” the man said. “I’m a trained civil engineer. I could be of some help here.”
“Thank you, sir,” Andy said. “What’s your name, please?”
“Erkan Zorlu.”
“It’s a stroke of luck that we have you here, Mr. Zorlu.”
The man nodded and smiled. “Call me Erkan. Glad to be of service.”
“Fuck!” Goran exclaimed and slapped his forehead with his hand. “I mean, sranje! The fridges! Of course!”
Andy looked at Goran. He didn’t frown this time. He started getting used to Goran’s cussing. “What about them?”
“The perishable food supplies will go rot soon without the power if the outage is permanent. We have to do something about it.”
Andy nodded. “Yes, you’re right.”
“And also water,” Goran said. “Back in my teenage years, I was in the siege of our city during the Yugoslav Wars, and we suffered from lack of water.”
“Yes,” Marcel said worriedly.
“Yeah,” Goran said. “We gotta fill all the bathtubs and all the receptacles we can find with water.”
“Besides, there is the water in the pools,” Andy remarked.
“We also have to keep the drinking water and non-drinking water separate,” added Erkan.
“So, water won’t be a problem,” Andy said.
“But we have to do it fast,” Goran said. “Who knows what will happen next? Water supply cutoff?”
“I’m afraid to even to think about it,” Diana said. “And also about the heating cutoff.”
People got agitated about the current problems, and it was getting noisy in the audience. It took Andy five minutes to call everybody to order.
A young man raised his hand. “Can you give me a gun so I could protect myself and my family?”
The red-faced troublemaker snorted. “A gun! One gun won’t help you much if you come across a crowd of those bloodsuckers. You’re walking meat for them.”
“Now this is really a big problem,” Andy said. “We have only five firearms in the hotel. They’re with the security guards.”
The family man looked disappointed.
It’s six, actually, but they don’t need to know about my shoulder holster, Andy thought. Besides, it’s still a drop in the ocean.
“We never needed so many weapons,” Andy said.
“Nine firearms,” said Marcel’s partner, a tall guy, wearing a black sports cap. He showed his Kalashnikov and a handgun and pointed to Marcel’s same set of arms. “Count us in.”
“And what shall we do then?” said the family man. “I got a wife and two kids in my room.”
“Oh man,” the tall cash messenger said. “There’s a lot of stuff you can use here for killing— knives, forks, table and chair legs, hammers, screwdrivers, pool cues. Take your pick. Hell, you can even kill using a fucking mascara pen eyeliner.” He tossed a pellet of chewing gum into his mouth.
Marcel said to the man, “Gleb, you’ve always been a professional.”
Gleb sat back, smirked and started chewing the gum.
“What are you talking about?” said the red-faced beer drinker. He had opened another beer can already. “Without arms, we’re all going to be fucking fodder for those freaks in no time!”
There was a general commotion again, and Andy had to dismiss the meeting.
“We’ve had enough of talking,” Andy said. “The sooner we begin doing something, the better.”
After the meeting, everyone was given a task to do. Some people helped to reinforce the barricades near doors, dragging all the sofas, tables, chairs, hassocks, and whatnot from the upper floors to block the doorways. Erkan Zorlu went into the basement to install the power generator. The sanitary engineer and two technicians helped him. The garage door had to be sealed, and Erkan could handle a welder’s equipment. He did his job in three hours.
The chambermaids continued to serve in the rooms. Some of them sought to escape from fear and depression, and they wanted to be around people. They were glad to be useful again. The guests were supportive and helped the maids. It seemed ridiculous to be complaining about dirty linen or dirty pillows in a critical situation like this when everything was falling apart. Some of them put their rooms in order themselves.
The waiters and waitresses went back to their duties. Due to the shortage of waiters, some of the guests volunteered to help out at mealtimes.
None of the guards were gone during the beginning of the chaos. Many strong men among the guests offered to be guards.
Andy understood that the people were close to panic, and it was necessary to go on acting as if everything was normal to keep their spirits up.
***
Ivan, the guard whose presence was not necessary anymore in the CCTV room because of the power outage, was standing near the window, as Andy walked along the corridor. There was a shade of worry on the man’s face.
“What’s wrong, Ivan?” Andy asked him.
“I don’t know, sir,” the young man said. “I just remember clearly that the cash-in-transit truck was at the north of the building. Now it has moved here.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes.”
“Keep watching,” Andy said. “If you see something unusual,” he held up his walkie-talkie, “let me know.”
“Sure.” Ivan nodded. “Right away.”
***
Goran ran his kitchen like a general in a battlefield. He was barking out orders to his cook assistants, those of them who hadn’t yet lapsed into depression and had come down into the kitchen to make meals. Some of them had come wearing jeans or other casual clothes, but Goran had made them put on their uniforms. He himself had his immaculately white chef hat on. It gave him extra power in the kitchen.
“Why do we need this outfit?” one of his assistants asked him. “Who cares? We could be dead in an hour.”
“Remember the Second World War history?” Goran asked him. “What was the first sign, which showed that concentration camp prisoners weren’t going to make it and die soon?”
The cook shook his head and looked quizzically at him.
“They stopped cleaning their teeth,” he said.
Nobody said a word.
“And besides,” Goran said. “We’re the