by Rod Rayborne
"You'll get it when the radio works," Cray answered.
Owen spun around, his face once again a bright shade of pink.
"Give me that notebook," he said slowly, staring unblinkingly at Cray. "I need those numbers to…"
Cray grasped the binder more firmly. "No Sir, I will not," he interrupted. "I'm to hand it over when the situation is secure, not before. The radio doesn't work, may never work. It seems you didn't provision more than one. Who knows when you'll find another. You'll get the numbers when you have a working radio. Those are my orders from my Commanding Officer." Cray stared at Owen with ill concealed contempt.
"Your CO might be your boss, be he's not mine. As long as you're in my city, you'll do as I say! Now hand me that goddamned notebook or I'll feed you to the dogs outside."
Cray shook his head. "I told you Owen..."
Owen nodded to the men standing on either side of Cray. They grabbed him, pinning his arms to his sides and pushed him roughly forward. One of them yanked the binder from Cray's right hand and passed it to Owen. For the first time Cray looked shakened.
Owen opened the binder, flipping slowly through the pages. Then slamming it shut, he passed it to the radio operator, looking back at Cray.
"I was commanding a battalion in Afghanistan while you were still pissing in your diapers. You should have showed a little more respect," he said with a grin. "Get him out of here."
"Wait a minute." Cray protested, "You can't just throw me out! I work for Lieutenant Colonel Sanger. I'm here as his attaché." He quailed slightly as he gazed into Owen's bloodshot eyes. "I'll need that notebook back when you're done with it. I can't leave here without it. It'll be my head."
"I can do anything I like. Last time I checked, Major General outweighed Lieutenant Colonel by three promotions. That candy-assed Sanger may be boss back in Washington but around here I'm head honcho." He nodded at the soldiers standing on either side of Cray. "You know that bank down the road? The tall one? Throw him off the roof."
Cray screamed then and one of the soldiers clapped a hand over his mouth. Yanking him backwards, he pulled him off his feet and dragged him towards the door. Owen held up a finger.
"Don't hurt him. I want him conscious when he hits the ground."
The soldier grinned and nodded. Another soldier joined him and together they hustled Cray out the door. Then Owen's voice called out after them.
"Mister attaché..."
The soldiers stopped and turned the frightened man around to face Owen once more. He looked at Cray solemnly.
"Have a nice trip."
The men in the room burst into nervous laughter. Another soldier coming towards them stood aside to let them pass and then entered the room. The soldier who had been sent to find Bennett. He looked apprehensively at Owen and saluted.
"Where's Bennett?" Owen growled. "I need him to translate these numbers."
"Sir, I'm sorry Sir. Bennett's gone."
Chapter Twenty Five
G ordon awoke minutes later soaked to the bone. A pipe had ruptured somewhere and water had covered the parking lot in a thin lake. He sat up, blinking against the flare billowing up in the distance. Another bomb, he wondered? Then he remembered the San Hedrol refinery. Stunned, he stood up, staring at the orange mushroom rising before him. In the gloom, it lit up the sky. He had never imagined that such a powerful threat was allowed to live so close to the city.
It had rained as well. A heavy, drenching rain, greasy and foul smelling. The rain had helped brighten the sky. Now it was darker again, though that was limited mostly to the area over the refinery.
The parking lot, like the store interior, looked like it had been swept clean by a monster wind. Only the larger vehicles remained close to where they had been when he entered the store, everything else was pushed against the building like dead leaves piled near a filthy hedgerow. Despite the rain, it was probably the water pipe that had saved Gordon from a severe burn.
Standing shakily, he looked down at himself. He doubted if he had ever been as filthy as he was right then. He was covered in streaks of grease, hair plastered to his head, fingernails black and clothes grime encrusted. He almost hoped he wouldn't see a friendly face just then. Undoubtedly the reaction to his appearance would be a shriek and a fast exit.
Pulling the rag from his face, he walked to the broken water main, his shoes squishing as he did, splashing the still erupting gusher over his head and face. Despite the rain, the temperatures remained well north of one hundred. The coolness the water from the broken pipe offered was, in the intense heat, welcome. He cupped his hands and drank deeply. Then dripping, he lifted the wet pack, pulled it over his shoulders and sloshed his was out of the parking lot.
Some hours later, Gordon stopped in the entryway to a bank, squatted down and opened his pack. He was hungry and now was as good a time as any to gather a little strength. The lightening along with the thunder had ceased for the time being, an uncommon quiet so visceral, he almost believed he could cut it with a knife. Except for the slow dripping of raindrops from a nearby tree, the city was as dank and silent as a mausoleum. Only the wan afterglow from the refinery explosion and a tepid sun cast a feeble orange light over the city.
Gordon opened the pack, reached inside and took out a box of cream pies. Damn, he had tried for more nutritious offerings but in the dark and his haste he had stuffed those in as well. He considered tossing them aside then stopped, shrugged and ripped open the box. They were chocolate with vanilla filling. Leaning against the ceramic causeway, he pushed the pies into his mouth one at a time. Then he took out a pint of bottled water to wash them down. After three of the pies, he slowed and looked around.
There was no movement, no sound, nothing but the hypnotic murmur of dripping falling from the trees. So rhythmic, it was almost lulling him to sleep. He paused then, a half chewed pastry between his teeth and listened more intently. It was rhythmic, too rhythmic. Pushing the pack aside, he stood up and stepped out onto the sidewalk.
A body lay a few feet away, a man, swollen and purple. Stiff, Gordon saw. One arm extended into the air at his side. He had died face down, his arms spread out before him and up. Something had turned him over after rigor mortis had set in. Possibly the second explosion he had just experienced.
He approached and turned his ear toward the body. He heard the ticking again. The man had a watch and it was still working. How could that be? The man was wearing a singed black pin striped suit. On the lapel was a tag, BOC Operations. He was a bank manager. Gordon looked at the insignia on the wall of the building where he had been squatting. Bank of California.
Gordon pulled up the man's sleeve. No watch. He looked over the suit. Fallen from one of the jacket pockets was a gold pocket watch, chain and all. He pulled the watch out and looked it over. How had this watch managed to escape the fate that had taken out every other electronic device? He turned the scrolled knob at the top. It clicked. That explained it. The watch was wind-up. It had been ticking for more than two days since its last winding. A marvel of craftsmanship, it had gone through two major blasts and several deep greasy rains and was still running.
A small smile touched Gordon's lips. Putting it to his ear, he listened to its gentle sonorous ticking. A strange warmth passed through him. Then gently, he wound it several times, feeling it's precise workings roll smoothly under his fingers. Instantly the ticking became louder. Then a thought struck him. He could see the time. He held it up, pressed down the wind knob and the faceplate popped open. He turned the clock towards the light from the refinery. 10:08 a.m.! He had been awake during what should have been daylight hours. His body had kept its natural circadian rhythms despite two days of unnatural darkness.
On the inside lid of the watch was etched a short message in fine scrollwork. Try though he might, turning the watch this was and that, he couldn't make out the message. He felt a little discomfited pocketing what had likely been a prized possession to the man lying on the sidewalk before him. But now t
hat he had the watch, he couldn't bear to give it back where it would wind down and stop a day or two hence. Whispering a thank you to his silent beneficiary, he pushed the watch into his front pants pocket, picked up his gear, and moved on down the road.
Gordon wanted to keep to as normal a sleep/waking schedule as he could manage. According to the clock. As far as he could tell, the sun might never shine again in all its glory. It was a deeply depressing thought, one he tried hard not to contemplate. Since the lightening had ceased it's frenetic strobing, at least for now and the bright orange in the clouds had faded to a milder umber, it became even more difficult to find his way. He moved stealthily forward. He was in the business district but the residential area was nearby. He knew that not by sight but memory.
The thought of finding a place somewhere he could stay, at least for a few weeks until he could decide what to do, was tempting. But his intuition told him he should get out of LA. There was a chance, a slim chance admittedly, that what happened in Los Angeles was an isolated event, (Los Angeles was the center of the world, after all) and the rest of the country was fine. A possibility, despite the EAS warning he'd heard, that blue skies and a cold beer waited just over the Orange County line. He had to know. Surely man had not trashed the entire fucking planet. We're good, he thought, but not that good.
Approaching the intersection of La Cienega and Wilshire Blvd, Gordon turned south moving towards Miracle Mile. Exhausted, he sat down on a short block wall that bordered the sidewalk and the lawn of a small house. Sliding out of the straps, he let the pack fall away, laying back on what was left of the lawn. The grass crackled under his weight. It sounded like crumpled wax paper. He looked up at the sky, shades of black, gray and sepia mixing in silent eddies, dots of bright orange winking in and out, glowing here, vanishing there, then reappearing somewhere else farther away. The silence weighed heavily on his mind. Then he heard some feet away from him the sad trilling of a lone cricket singing out for a friend. The sound went unanswered and a sadness crept over Gordon. Finally the cricket quieted it's mournful song and silence reigned.
Gordon felt the weight of loneliness settle gently over him like a gray blanket of ash drifting down from the sky. He wondered how his friends, his loved ones, had died. He prayed that it had been sudden, unseen and unfelt. His brother Ed. How had that gone? He couldn't imagine him gone. He was too mean to die. Not without a fight, at least. He would have been one of those who had raged against the coming of the night. No doubt about it.
He thought about his father then. A gentle man among gentlemen. The only person he had ever known who'd actually cared about him. He wondered how he would have handled the Apocalypse. Knowing him, he supposed he might take an expansive view, if for no other reason than to bolster his sons' flagging morale.
"Everything is relative," he'd said on more than one occasion when some small tragedy would rock Gordon's world. Soft-spoken, it was a view he repeated less often with the death of his wife.
He'd already lost his mother at an early age. Then his father had been taken from him the night before his high school graduation. In the wrong place at the wrong time, crushed by a drunk driver. Dead in an instant. No pain, so they said.
News travels fast. Gordon was told the next day that he need not attend the ceremonies but he was there just the same as he knew his father would have expected. When he walked onto the stage to receive his diploma, he held it high and said a word, only one word, into the mic, 'Dad'.
It was all he trusted himself to say and his voice shook as he said it. But that one word brought down the house. The audience jumped to their feet in applause. Remembering it now brought a lump to his throat.
Though he knew it was evening, the sky appeared to brighten somewhat as he lay there looking up at it. He was sure he was imagining it but let his eyes slowly wander across the black expanse. It did seem that the sky was losing its inky hue at least in a few spots across the heavens. Gordon sat up and studied it closely. Not only was the sky lightening, the clouds and smoke were stirring noticeably. Since he had first crawled out from beneath his car, other than the churning motion of the clouds that boiled in place, they hadn't actually seemed to be going anywhere in any kind of a hurry. Now it looked as though they were on the march, moving southeastward as they used to before. Before.
Then a stirring around him. First a quiet shuffle, the flutter of leaves drifting down the street. Not leaves, paper. That any paper remained to drift anywhere was a wonder to Gordon. The leaves were gone in an instant the moment the fireball erupted but paper blown from inside buildings, dumpsters and distanced from ground zero, were aplenty. He sat hunched forward, hands together, watching the debris pirouette in the warm breeze with an increasingly nervous sounding discord.
The wind ruffled his hair, tossing it back and forth across his scalp. Then, for a moment, the lone cricket trilled again. Hopeful little bugger. He smiled. This was the first tentative exercise of nature he had felt for days. Not the crush of the scorching gale. A breeze.
The sound somehow eased his loneliness, proved to him that something still worked, that the Earth hadn't given up. He stood, the rag he wore as a mask whipping in the wind, cracking the way a flag will on a gusty Fall day. Lifting his pack, he dragged it on heavily, the wind assisting him in the effort. Then he turned his steps to match the direction of the breeze, letting it carry him down the street.
Chapter Twenty Six
T he body dangled upside down, one twisted foot wedged between a pair of braces that ran from the open warehouse rafters to the chinked aluminum ridge beam some thirty feet above. The galvanized rafters themselves, like everything else in the building, were torn apart, hanging like an oblique effigy of the body swaying beneath them.
On the concrete floor below the body, a pool of blood had formed and was spreading out, growing larger with each new drop fed by the thin tributaries that ran along the sides of the dead man's face from eyes, ears and mouth to mingle and spill from the forehead in a red cascade, seeping downward in lazy drifts.
The man stood up dizzily and then stumbled backward into the blood. He slipped and went down hard, twisting his left wrist when it caught in a torn crevice that had once been the top of a desk or a table or... something. His head smacked the floor, his own blood mixing with the effluent of the thing hanging high above him.
The man lifted his face from the muck, coughed twice and then vomited into the drying blood. He stood up again, wiping his mouth on the back of his arm and the blood of the man above him on his pants. He turned then and staggered through the warehouse, tripping over the wreckage that was strewn about and around the other bodies scattered across the floor.
When he reached the doorway he stopped, his head reeling with the acrid stench of the burnt things that swelled his nostrils. His eyes began to roll upward into his head once again but he caught himself, falling back against and sliding down the door frame instead. He pulled a greasy cloth that was lying near him over his mouth to try to filter out some of the putrid odor, hacking into it several times, gagging on the bile that bubbled in his throat. Then he twisted his bleary eyes outward and gaped.
Through the doorway, a heavy yellow soot rolled across the sky, emanating from an unseen valley beyond the low hills some miles away. The sky was clearer, lighter here than over other parts of the city, but the new explosion threatened to change all that in a hurry.
Where huge oil storage tanks, an ungodly maze of stainless steel pipes, pressure relief valves and monster sized cranes stood at the refinery only moments before, stumps of raw steel and burning tires now rested haphazardly. Fractured shards of glass, ripped and twisted girders, buckled asphalt and a thick sooty fire, all gave mute testimony to the force of the blast.
The grounds around the warehouse where Owen's 'Forward Team' were secretly stationed, looked almost as bad. Walls blown out, sidewalks buckled, cars overturned.
The man looked back into the warehouse. Around him were littered the shattered rema
ins of Kane and his men. Not military, these were people who'd been secretly commissioned by certain elements in the military to assist them in the stickier aspects of the anticipated rebuilding of LA, should the need ever arise. Little better than hired thugs, they were a loose confederacy of murderers, thieves, assassins and con men gathered from the country's most secure prisons by unnamed individuals. They were dressed like any other survivor, but their rough appearance, tattoos and piercings belied that. They and a handful of other such 'teams' located around the country were to work with representatives of the government on a strictly cash per assist basis.
Cash meaning their choice of recovered goods, absolute autonomy from government interference in their operations and freedom from pursuit in the future reconstructed America. Their assistance consisted of clearing away pockets of resistance to the new order by any means necessary. That was it. No questions asked.
They were there to protect the new government from possible accusations of wrongdoing and we're made to understand that if captured by anti-government forces, the government would deny any knowledge of their schemes and would pursue criminal charges against them.
They were fall guys.
And they did fall, some of them. Groans, low and wet, began to sound around the wide empty room. Empty but for the men or parts thereof lying about, some propped on elbows hacking blood, speckling the chunked floor beneath them with their putrid bile. Others, blasted into human shrapnel, freckled the molten ruins in bloody patches like so much confetti.
Leaning against a collapsed metal wall near the twisted bay door through which the man had driven it was the vehicle he barely recognized as the 1968 Chevy C10 pickup he had found only a day before, teetering precariously, held in place by the traction of one blown Michelin. The paint was gone now, only blackened metal remaining.
Standing again and stumbling through the door, the man made his way to the loading dock and walking to the platform's edge, teetered there and then jumped, smoke erasing his view of the wide lot. He landed on a car roof and losing his footing, fell heavily onto the hood and rolled to the ground.