Town on Fire: A Post-Apocalyptic EMP Survival Series, 25BF Season 2 (25 Bombs Fell)

by A. K. Meek

  As they neared the courthouse, people on the street stopped to stare as the working truck flew by.

  Kurt skidded to a stop just outside the sheriff’s office. Citizens were already congregating, running to the truck, inspecting the vehicle and the contents. They crowded the around, barraging them with questions of where they’d been and how the truck was able to run.

  Instead of answering, Kurt pushed his way out of the cab, yelling, “There’s no time for this. Telly’s been shot. We need to get him to the clinic.”

  Already, hands were at work offloading him. Citizens linked arms, creating a human litter. Sandy got out, still dabbing her injured forehead. She followed them, Rainier followed her.

  Kurt went to the back of the truck. Ms. Momma, who was sitting there cross-legged, eyes wide like she had just suddenly been dumped into a new world, didn’t say a word. Her hands were clenched, her arms against her chest. Kurt motioned for her come to him and after a few seconds of hesitation she slowly reached. He took her thin hand and helped her off the back of the truck.

  Audrey emerged from the crowd. Her arm was bandaged, her leg was bandaged, and with her good arm she clumsily grasped a crutch. “Kurt,” she said, “what’s going on? I heard about your escapade.” Her jaw was set. It wasn’t the first time he had seen this look from her. “How dare you wander off into the night without letting—”

  “I couldn’t tell you. I didn’t even know what I was doing till I was already halfway there. It was Johnny. I had to see what was going on.”

  “Did you find…” Aubrey lost her train of thought at the sight of Ms. Momma. She investigated the old woman with curious eyes.

  Kurt noticed Audrey’s unasked question. “We rescued her. There’s something else out there. Something ev—”

  “Sheriff!” Ernest’s voice was almost a shriek. Bartel’s emergency manager burst through the crowd, running full bore. “We caught Councilman Ted. You wouldn’t believe it. He gave up an hour ago.” The man slowed before he ran headlong into Kurt. “Mayor,” he said. “We got him.”

  Kurt turned to him. “What do you mean?”

  The enthusiasm reignited in his eyes. He smiled proudly as he said, “He’s in a detention cell. I was on patrol, because you know I help out when I can. We were over in the developments when I noticed strange noises from his house. When we investigated, he was there. He just gave up. Said he was tired of hiding.” Ernest puffed his chest out when he finished the story, watching the mayor like he was hoping for a commendation right on the spot.

  Kurt turned back to the mayor. “We saw something out there. I don’t know what it was. Don’t know if it’s headed here.”

  More citizens had gathered around the truck. Including Reverend Farah. He stepped forward.

  Aubrey gave a not too subtle sigh at his approach. “Not now, Reverend, we’ve got other matters going on.”

  “Oh no, mayor,” he said, a sly grin creeping across this face. “I can guarantee this is the most important thing at the moment.”

  Kurt had a sinking feeling in his stomach. Call it intuition from his years as a lawman. He scanned the crowd and recognized many of Farah’s congregants, black men, which had become scarce since the town divided. There were many, all wearing coats and jackets, completely inappropriate for this weather. He cursed himself for not noticing this earlier.

  Leaning close to the mayor, he began to whisper in her ear, but didn’t get a chance to say a word.

  Reverend Farah stepped back as he pulled a pistol from under his jacket. He pointed it square at Aubrey’s head. Kurt’s sinking feeling turned into a painful pulse. Instinctively, he reached for his own service pistol.

  “No, no, Sheriff,” Farah said. “That would definitely be a mistake for the mayor, and for you.”

  Farah’s men all pulled rifles and pistols. The rest of the crowd panicked, first screaming, then scattering in a mad rush.

  What initially registered as fear on Aubrey’s face quickly transformed to anger. She took a clumsy step toward Farah, her one good arm struggling to make the crutch cooperate. “If you think pulling a gun on me is going to make—”

  “I don’t think anything, except this town is no longer yours,” Farah said, his pistol swinging from the mayor to Kurt. “Or his, for that matter. I’ve seen your incompetency firsthand. You’re no longer fit to serve.”

  A bystander, an older man wearing a VFW baseball cap, who had been holding his wife in his arms, leaped forward and grabbed at the nearest of Farah’s men. Although the man clearly overmatched the old veteran, the old man hung on, grappling with the rifle until another one of Farah’s thugs moved close and pistol-whipped him. With a moan he dropped to the ground. His wife screamed and ran to him.

  Kurt wanted to pull his pistol and blow Farah’s head off, but he couldn’t risk Aubrey. Or anyone.

  In the distance, a dog began barking. The loudness and intensity was so out of place, it gave everyone pause. A man screamed in terror, some distance away, but close enough for bloodcurdling fear to rise up Kurt’s spine.

  More barking.

  Two more screams. A sickening, wet sound, such as when a dog violently thrashes his favorite chew toy, topped off the barking.

  “Wild dogs!” someone yelled.

  “No, no, no,” Farah whined. “They said I could take care of this.”

  Mastiffs, pit bulls, and Rottweilers poured around a street corner. Easily over sixty dogs. Possibly a hundred. And when the dogs saw the townspeople gathered in front of the courthouse, their rigorous and torturous months of training kicked in. They snarled and sped up, heading for the crowd with well-honed bloodlust.

  The Dog Pound had arrived in Bartel.

  People scattered. Several armed citizens stood their ground and started firing on the charging beasts.

  Three dogs yelped. Two hit the ground, dead. A third turned and high-tailed, disappearing into bushes. But many more made it through the initial barrage and each chose a new play toy. Some two.

  The dogs lunged at their prey. They clamped onto arms and legs and shook vigorously, their natural killing instinct enhanced be training. One exceptional pit bull managed to leap and clamp down on a short teenage girl’s neck, dragging her to the ground with a rooster tail spray of blood.

  Farah took three steps back, fear plain on his face and in his movements. He looked around wildly, searching for his men. Four had grouped together close to a Mexican food joint called Los Sombrero, about a half block away. They had formed a protective position, back to back, facing outward with automatic rifles. They picked off charging dogs. Farah took off in a full sprint toward them.

  Kurt pulled his revolver. And for a second, he contemplated shooting Farah in the back. But as he was thinking it, a large brindle Mastiff latched hold of the tails of his jacket that fluttered wildly behind him. The large dog and its unexpected weight took Farah by surprise and he tumbled sideways and then rolled. That was enough for the brindle’s companion, a smoky gray Mastiff wider than it was tall, to grab his forearm, the arm that held his pistol. The dog clamped its teeth and shook with rage. Even from this distance Kurt could hear bones snapping. Farah screamed.

  The scream also shook Kurt from his horrible voyeurism. He realized he was in just as much danger as Farah. He needed to get Aubrey to safety.

  He grabbed hold of her and lifted her as carefully—but as expeditiously—as he could to sling her into the bed of the pickup truck. Then he turned his attention to Ms. Momma, but she had moved to the front of the truck.

  A dog clamped onto Kurt’s leg and he grunted as its teeth punctured his calf. A brown Rottweiler dug its feet into the asphalt and jerked pulling him backward, its mouth full of denim and flesh. Kurt leaned over and pressed his revolver barrel to the top of the dog’s head.

  A gunshot, and the dog dropped, releasing Kurt’s leg.

  He turned in time to see another dog leap up and slam into Ms. Momma’s torso. With her emaciated body she couldn’t withstand a hundred pou
nds of muscle. She tumbled backward, slamming into the bumper, then collapsed to the ground. The dog lunged at her throat. Kurt turned away as he saw two more dogs grab hold of her skinny, flailing arms.

  His injured leg screamed in protest but he forced it onto the truck wheel well and hoisted himself into the back of the pickup, out of reach of the dogs. Hopefully.

  Clive and Sandy emerged from the clinic, half a block away. Five more deputies poured from the sheriff’s office. They locked and loaded and fired at scrambling dogs.

  By now, the initial surprise had ended, and citizens were returning en masse with firearms, ready to engage the dogs. Some of the people even carried pitchforks and two by fours.

  On top of the truck, pistol ready for any dog able to make its way onto the bed, Aubrey at his side, Kurt took a moment to survey the situation.

  Bodies lay broken in the streets, on the courtyard steps, on the once-manicured lawn. A woman in the distance still had dogs latched onto her, shaking the poor soul like they were trying to squeeze every last bit of life from their thrashing victim.

  Dogs were strewn about, some curled up in tight balls, looking asleep if not for the puddles of red around them. Trails of bright red blood, human and animal, had sprayed and trickled and splashed across streets and lawns, grim graffiti of death.

  A flood of thoughts rushed through his mind. What happened to Farah, what did he mean? Was he part of this plan? If so, the plan fell apart pretty quickly. But that was little consolation for all he’d witnessed over the last few minutes.

  Gunfire dropped off as most of the dogs were killed or scattered. Occasionally, a distant scream or bark or stray crack of a weapon echoed off the buildings. For the most part though, the wave of attack dogs ended.

  Glancing at Aubrey, he took a cleansing breath. She appeared okay. Except for his aching calf, he felt okay. He could breathe now. Bartel had faced the worst of the Dog Pound and survived. Rubbing the mayor’s shoulder, Kurt said, “It’s okay, Aub. It’s all over now. Nothing more to worry you.”

  05.02

  THE LAST ACT

  A low, mechanical hum, resonated in the humid late morning. The whine of an engine. As Kurt’s mind struggled to process the noise, a semi barreled down the street, headed for the courthouse. Black exhaust poured from its stacks.

  “What in the—” Kurt began.

  “Shoot it!” Clive yelled. “Shoot it!” He leaped behind a Honda that had jumped the curb, braced himself over the hood, and drew a bead with his rifle.

  The driver blew the air horn again and again. It could’ve been a naval battleship pulling into port. With each blast, windows shook. The truck slammed into an SUV, pushing it aside as easily as brushing a leaf away. Next the semi skipped the curb and flattened two slender spruces before splintering a wooden utility pole. Overhead wires snapped in bullwhip fury, lashing the air.

  The driver of the runaway semi leaped from the seat, tucking and rolling on the courthouse lawn. The massive vehicle continued forward and took the service steps on the west side of the building, slamming into the wall with a crash and fury.

  Before Kurt could react, Bartel erupted in a rain of gunfire.

  The Dog Pound had used the dogs, and now the semi, as a diversion. But now came the main assault as Bob’s men infiltrated Bartel.

  They didn’t care who they killed. As far as the Dog Pound was concerned, Bartel East and Bartel West didn’t matter. They were all part of the town that had interrupted the Dog Pound’s human trafficking scheme. Bob wanted the town wiped off the map.

  As Kurt dropped into the truck bed, covering Aubrey with his own body, he thought of his brother, Johnny.

  Was he a part of this? Was he here? If it came down to it, could he kill his brother? Could he pull the trigger to stop his brother from committing any more evil? Like what he did to LaTonya? Like what he wanted to do to Janelle?

  That wasn’t his brother.

  His brother pouted when he thought Kurt got the larger scoop of ice cream. Only when they used a ruler to measure the height was he satisfied. barely. Johnny followed Kurt to football practice. He sat in the stands, near the top, always watching, even though he downplayed being there. That was his brother. Not this killer.

  A bullet whizzed by Kurt’s head. Another plinked into the truck fender. “Stay down,” he said to Aubrey. She did.

  Still holding his pistol with only a few shots left, he wished for something more. He’d even lost track of how many bullets he had. To add insult, someone with a semi-automatic rattled off their magazine. He definitely needed a better weapon.

  Peeking his head out from the truck bed, he saw Sandy twenty feet away, ducking behind a car. He motioned for her and she scurried toward him, until three rounds zipped overhead, causing her to stop in place. “Go tell everyone to spread out through town. Have every citizen grab a gun and resist. We’re being overrun.”

  She nodded and sprinted back toward the sheriff’s office, ducking and zigzagging to avoid bullets.

  Kurt decided he needed to get to the safety of the office, him and Aubrey both. They could possibly seek shelter inside the gun vault. They were too beat up to make a run for anywhere farther away.

  “We gotta go. We’re sitting ducks here.” She nodded as he slid to the tailgate, positioning himself. Once he slid off the truck he grabbed Aubrey and lifted her off. He attempted to set her down on the ground but once he fumbled, almost spilling with her to the ground, he decided it was best to carry her to safety. Cradling her in his arms, he ran as fast as he could to the office. His leg burned with a new round of pain.

  As he reached the door a stray bullet ricocheted off a wall and shattered one of the large plate glass windows. He tumbled to the floor, spilling Audrey. With every last ounce of strength, he crawled across the threshold and dragged her the rest of the way inside, then with his good leg kicked the door shut.

  Three volunteer deputies had also hunkered down inside the building, tucked underneath a desk. He could see by the look on their faces they were terrified into indecision. Someone needed to snap them out of this shocked state. There was no time for people to sit around and contemplate the situation.

  Kurt glared at them angrily. “Where’s your weapons?” he barked. They stared at each other. One, a tanned man in his mid-thirties said in a thick Mexican accent, “We weren’t sure… we’re not deputies yet.”

  Clive had been interviewing citizens to fill more deputy holes, but Kurt hadn’t had the opportunity to meet any of them yet. Obviously, these were new recruits. Very new.

  “Our town’s under attack,” he explained in case they missed it. “We’re being overrun. Arm yourselves and fight for your lives.”

  This down and dirty summation inspired them enough that they ran to the gun vault at the back of the building. One of them popped his head from around the corner. “All that’s left is a shotgun and some pistols.”

  “Bring me the shotgun,” Kurt said. Shortly, the man emerged with a shotgun and an ammo tin of shells. He sat them down by Kurt. The other two came holding the remaining 9 mm pistols, the last of the Bartel sheriff’s office armory.

  Lifting himself so he leaned against the wall, Kurt checked his leg, tightening a bandage crafted from a jacket he found lying on the floor. “This is very important,” he said to the recruits as he cinched a double knot over the bloody dog bite, “we’re getting shot up out there. We’re completely overrun. But I need you to go find all the deputies—no, find anyone you can that’s able to fight, and let them know this is it. We’re probably surrounded. Every house could have somebody in it. But you need to find our people and let them know to fight. You are key to this.”

  The three stared at each other, handed a reprieve from the paralyzing fear and inaction they’d experienced only moments ago. They nodded in unison, but scattered in different directions, hopeful to live up to the task Kurt charged them with.

  “Is this them?” Aubrey asked. She repositioned her arm and she sat up against the
same wall Kurt leaned on, next to him. “Is this the Dog Pound?”

  He nodded. “It’s the Dog Pound. I think they’re a little upset with us.”

  “We’ll be able to fight them off, right?” Aubrey looked to her sheriff, the guarantor of law and order for Bartel, for that assurance it would be all right. Justice and law and order would be restored in this otherwise lawless new world. That’s how it’s supposed to end.

  He didn’t answer, but just sat there, listening to the gunfire.

  It’d already been several minutes they sat listening to large and small caliber fire. Every single Fourth of July he’d ever experienced rolled up into the past thirty minutes. As he waited though, the barrage tapered slightly. Maybe the gun battle was drawing down, after all.

  Either all the ammunition was finally spent or worse yet, people were being killed at an alarming rate. He thought of the bloodbath he’d seen earlier with the dogs but didn’t want to imagine how much more blood and how much more loss of life there would be with this new assault.

  “What’s going on out there?” a voice from the hallway rang out. Kurt recognized Councilman Ted.

  “Not much, just our town is getting slaughtered. That’s all.”

  “It sure sounds like it.” Pause. “You’re not going to leave me here to die, are you?”

  “I just might,” Kurt said, not really caring about Ted any more than he cared for the dogs outside.

  He lifted himself enough to glance outside. Even from the low vantage point, with vehicles blocking a portion of the view, he could see an occasional person dart from one place to another. Two men holding rifles raced from a doorway to disappear around a corner.

  The gunfire continued to diminish, shots sporadic and distant. He dropped back down next to Aubrey. “Is it over?” she asked.

  Kurt shrugged, “Don’t know. I’m not sure how much more we can take—”

  A monstrous explosion rattled the town.

  It reverberated through their chests, shocking them silent.

  Windows blew out, raining shards of glass. They covered their heads with arms.