Ring of Fire

by David Agranoff

Montgomery pointed to his headphones. The general slipped his back on.

  “You’re on with the general now.”

  “Sir, this the new forward operating base in Carlsbad.”

  “I copy, base camp.”

  “We were scanning for live signals as ordered.”

  “What have you got?”

  “A live Wi-Fi network went online downtown. We are going to have signals throughout the area.”

  “It was my understanding the fire took out fiber optics...”

  “This is a satellite uplink. We traced the source by its IP, it is the NBC building.”

  Redcrow cursed. Anyone getting a signal out was bad, but a news agency was worst case.

  “Understood. In route.”

  ***

  Victoria pushed Scott away and crawled into the dining room. She got a look at Austin holding Robbins’ hand, but had no sympathy for her in that moment. She heard her husband sobbing on the far side of the room. He had come down from the table, and held Damian’s body in his arms. Victoria could see him through the table. She used a chair to pull herself up.

  Jake hugged the blood covered boy tight, as he cried. She could see Scott fighting to keep Tiffany out of the room. It sounded like Andrew was helping. Victoria stepped closer. He had shut their boy’s eyes, his face stained from the red tears. She might have believed he was sleeping, but the gun sat on the floor beside him. The shirt she had picked out for him to wear to school this morning was now stained with blood. The bullet had traveled out his back. She had covered stories as a reporter with dead children and had nightmares like this.

  “What have you done?” She wanted to yell it at him. It came out in a voice just above a whisper.

  He opened foggy eyes and looked at her. “You and Tiff have to survive.”

  Victoria couldn’t put into words what she felt. Sorrow was not strong enough of a word. She felt a pain building inside her. Damian’s body was a shield, the only thing protecting her husband. She wanted to punch him, claw his eyes, anything to make sure he understood what he had done. She had more questions. How could he live with himself? What were they going to tell the world? How would they handle Tiffany now? None of it came from her mouth.

  “He was suffering,” Jake whispered.

  She understood that. They had to try. How could it end this way? The pain burned. She had to look away but there was Austin with her friend who Jake had also killed.

  She stared at the dead man. Now she found her voice. “How will you live with what you have done?”

  Andrew appeared at the edge of the room. “Tell her, Jake.”

  Victoria turned back to her husband. He often thought he was protecting her and ended up making matters worse. Always making matters worse. Eventually, she would be alone with what he did.

  “Tell me what?”

  He held Damian tight and just shook his head.

  “Goddamn it, tell her, Jake!”

  Jake looked over his dead son’s head at his wife. “Cancer, it’s aggressive. The only treatment is risky. They have to do chemo in-surgery, with my guts out of the way. I don’t stand a chance. I’ll be with him soon.”

  She shook with barely contained rage. “Good.”

  ***

  Will stepped back into the studio and picked up his headphones. The radio station was still broadcasting the loop of him talking from earlier. Alex had left it playing but had given him a dump button on his board. He always had it, so he could dump phone callers who were jackasses. He slipped the headphones on and pushed the button. The red on-air button came on.

  Will took a deep breath that he knew went out on the air. There was a bank of TVs they had on the wall that were turned off. He could see his reflection in the dark screens. His eyes were turning the same color as Jeff’s had. His head hurt, like someone had reached in and was squeezing his brain. The pressure didn’t stop now. That said, he felt some clarity. He knew it was over.

  He pulled the microphone closer.

  “This is it, San Diego. Willy Goldberg’s final broadcast. I know some of you numbnut douche bags never thought I would survive this station. Talking about chicks with big titties and calling out fatties. Oh, he’ll say something to get himself fired again. I know you all thought that was coming.”

  “Me too. I’ll be honest with you, I never believed any of that stuff. This was an act, entertainment. Not top dollar stuff but this was my kingdom. I lost this job for a year and you all asked me to come back. My wife asked me to walk away and like a dumbass I couldn’t. You see, I survived the radio station, but not this day.”

  “I am infected. I don’t know what I drank, what I ate or what I breathed to get this disease. I can tell you that before it takes my sanity and turns me into one of those ferals that it hurts like a son of a bitch. The pain is . . .”

  Will looked around the studio.

  “You don’t give a fuck. I just have a few things I need to say before I figure some way to end it all. Don’t try to survive this and don’t blame it on others. You and I all worked together on this. As a species we did this. We hunted the fucking buffalos and whales till they were not there anymore. We filled list after list with endangered species, each one we added might seem like nothing – the Idaho barn owl or the Indonesian rat. Those guys add up. We bought the cars, drove them. We pumped the gas out of the ground and put it back in the air. We industrialized the food and animals we ate. You know, I made fun of that Leo Decrapio guy right here on this station for that cowspiracy shit. I wanted to ring his pencil neck when my youngest daughter declared after watching it that she was a hardcore vegan. It lasted a few days. We could get a few days of concern out of anybody. Sure, you’ll care when asked but who of us actually acted to stop this? Who?”

  “I know what you’re thinking. Get to the point, Willy. The fucking world is dying out here. Look around. Rewind to yesterday. Blind to it, the world just moments from ending. You did it. You caused this. I did it. I caused this. Remember that when you pray for a savior. I am not saying God is not listening, someone has to be the adult and wear the pants around here. Clean up your mess or you are out of here. No one to blame but ourselves.”

  “Fuck you, human race. Do you even understand the incredible amount of luck it takes to end up with a planet this livable? OK, so if you believe in God, do you understand that we are shitting, literally dumping on God’s creation? I don’t care what you believe in . . . fuck you, all of you. For real. Fuck you hard. Life is a gift. We wasted it on smartphones and your online fantasy worlds. You gonna waste life drunk or watching reality TV. The list of ways humans waste their lives is long and depressing. Fuck you, fuck you.”

  A wave of pain spread through Will. He felt like a flamethrower warming up. He struggled to contain a scream. The fury of his thoughts matched the feeling throughout his nervous system. His mind was shutting down. He could feel it ending. Sign off, sign off he thought. A sign-off for the ages.

  “I know I sound like the fucking Unabomber, but the proof is in the water, food and air. I have no information left to give you. I hope this doesn’t spread beyond our city, but nothing that happened here today is unique to us. So I am going to sign off with a message for my girls. A message for their kids they probably won’t get to have. Maybe they will. This message to any future generations who may or may not be around to hear this...”

  Pain, a tear escaped from his wincing eyes. “My final message to the future generations of this planet. We are sorry. Very sorry for everything we did to you.”

  Will reached up through radiating pain to push the button that would cut the signal. His finger hovered near the button but he didn’t make it. His heart spiked and the last thing he felt was his face hitting the desk.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Scott laid the blanket out on the dining room floor, and carefully laid his nephew’s body on the blanket. He covered the body and closed his eyes. Jake had snapped, sorrow and anger battled for control. Jake cried out and hit himself ov
er and over. Scott turned back to grab his hands. Jake muttered under his breath and gripped the water bottle Damian drank out of.

  “It happened so fast,” he whispered.

  Scott nodded. “We knew the water was toxic.”

  “What the fuck.” Jake shook his head. “All this. Why me? Why the fuck did this happen?”

  Scott hated seeing his brother like this. He didn’t have a son, he couldn’t imagine the pain. He shook his shoulder.

  “We’ll come back for Damian and give him a proper burial. I promise. You got to pull it together, bro.”

  Jake’s eyes were red from tears, not infection but he looked pathetic. “She’ll never forgive me.”

  Scott said the only thing he could. “She needs you. Tiffany needs you.”

  Jake nodded, he was not OK, all the cracks had burst and his sanity was hanging by a thread. He couldn’t make him help.

  “Get yourself together. We are getting out of here.”

  Scott grabbed the blanket and lifted Damian’s body. It was easier that when he and Andrew moved Robbins’s body. He carefully lifted him up the stairs and put his body in one of the bedrooms that had belonged to the Murphy kids. Scott took three long breaths, he needed he needed to stay strong for his brother. Scott turned and his heart jumped.

  Jake stood in the doorway. He was barely standing, leaned up against the frame. “I need a minute.”

  Scott saw the hopelessness in his eyes and looked down to see the pistol in his hand. Scott was angry with himself. He just left the pistol down there on the table with his brother on the edge of madness.

  Scott shook his head and put out his hand. “Give it to me.”

  Jake cried. Scott grabbed the pistol and hugged his brother.

  “We’re ready,” Andrew yelled from down stairs.

  “Jake, you still have a family to save.” Scott didn’t look in. Jake wept into this shoulder.

  “I’m already dead.”

  “When did you find out about the cancer?”

  Jake shook his head. “This morning.”

  Scott couldn’t believe it, but he had no reason not to. “Why didn’t you tell, Vic?”

  “I didn’t exactly have a good moment.” Jake bumped into his shoulder as he passed. “I don’t need your judgment, Scotty. Not now.”

  Scott followed him down the stairs. “I told you I would support you. Whatever you need.”

  Andrew waited at the bottom of the stairs. The Murphy family had an SUV that would fit the five of them, and the keys were hanging by the door to the garage. Andrew loaded up supplies, while they figured out what to do with Jake. Victoria waited with the kids in the living room. She looked out the window but all they could see was the smoke.

  Austin waited at the bottom of the stairs wearing a backpack. She held a well-used notebook and had Robbins’s holster on her hip now. Scott took a moment to notice her striking blue eyes, once he got past her harsh style he saw a classically beautiful woman. Another day he would have flirted with her.

  “I’m going to.”

  “Adam already has to sit on Vic’s lap.” Andrew shook his head. “No room. I’m sorry.”

  Austin pointed at Jake. “He just killed my oldest friend in the world. You owe him the dignity of getting this book out to the world. I’m going.”

  Victoria appeared holding Tiffany’s hand.

  “I’ll sit in back if I have to,” Tiffany offered. A brave and kind gesture for the fourteen year old kid. Scott was struck in the moment by how much she looked like her mother. Like Jake was not even involved. The tension was thick.

  “I’ll stay.” Jake looked away from his wife and daughter.

  “Oh, no you don’t.” Victoria’s anger never faded. “You don’t get to give up on all of us.”

  “I’ll sit in the back, just get me out of the city,” said Austin. She looked at Scott and his pistol “You might need my bullets, you’re running low.”

  Andrew shook his head. “I can make room for Austin, but might have to leave some of the food I packed.”

  No one felt comfortable eating even the canned food at this point. He didn’t pack that much.

  The lights flickered, everyone looked up. The power snapped. Suddenly they were in darkness. Andrew pulled out his keys that had a mini-flash light on it. The tiny light was all they had. It seemed impossibly dark. Scott felt panic inside, and was glad that the dark hid his fear.

  They all followed Andrew’s light to the garage door, and ran to the large SUV. He flipped on the lights that shined down onto the small workshop at the back of the garage. Jake was the last through the door. The smell of the smoke was stronger in the garage. Scott watched his brother move closer to Victoria. He tried to put his hand on her shoulder. She pulled away from him.

  Scott came over to his brother. He thought about telling him he did the right thing, he would say it until he believed it. Then they heard a scream outside the garage door. More screams as the ferals gathered on the other side. The hours in the smoke gave the tortured screams an added scratch that made them sound like painful war cries.

  Everyone froze and stared in the direction of the sound. It sounded like a dozen or more were out there.

  “Get in, now,” begged Andrew.

  Victoria and Austin sat in the back seat. Adam climbed on Victoria’s lap after he buckled in. Jake went to help Tiffany climb in the open hatchback. She reflexively pulled her hand back. It felt like daggers in his heart, the look of fear on his daughter’s face. Jake nodded and pushed hatchback shut. She had a small space next to two cases of water in duffel bags. There was plenty of room in the tall Ford Escalade.

  Jake took the seat in the back, Austin next to him in the middle. Scott took the front passenger seat and turned to look back as Andrew sat down and turned on the engine.

  “We ready to do this?” Scott asked. Nods went around. Andrew pulled the last door shut. He hit the garage door opener. They all turned to watch out the back. The garage door let in the smoke like dry ice on a stage. The red glow of the brake lights lit the waiting ferals. As the door folded into the ceiling they ran to surround. Andrew shifted into reverse and hit the gas.

  The thuds and crunches were extreme as they plowed through the crowd. The ferals screams changed as several were crushed. Scott turned back but the smoke was thick enough they could not see the wreckage. Andrew turned them around in the street.

  Even through the smoke they could faintly see the glowing lights of downtown. They at least still had power. That was a relief to Scott.

  They drove in almost silence. The gunfire and screams continued in the distance. Andrew pushed them slowly through the smoke. They had to stop and backtrack when they ran into a row of trolley trains frozen on the tracks. They didn’t have far to go but it felt like time slowed. Scott kept his hand on the pistol.

  Downtown was quiet—to call it a ghost town was an understatement. City Beat and San Diego Reader magazines tumbled in the wind like tumbleweeds in the old west.

  “Is Will still on the air?” Jake asked.

  Andrew looked at him in the rearview mirror. He shrugged and turned on the radio. Nothing but static on FM still. He twisted the dial until he landed on 690.

  He only had it on for a few seconds but it was enough. The signal was strong alright, but it transmitted a familiar sound. Over and over. Feral screams and pounding.

  Scott reached down and turned it off.

  “Almost there,” Andrew said as they passed a sign for San Diego City College.

  ***

  “Citizens of San Diego and the world . . .” The mayor cleared his throat. He straightened his shoulders and practiced it again. “Citizens of San Diego and the world . . .”

  Martin gave a thumbs up. Carly Clark was the one who was monitoring the computer with the signal. From here in the control room the majority of the monitors were turned off or played muted static. Across the glass, Jeff Gonola was reading his update. They had been broadcasting online for less than a minute
.

  “Now, with a statement from City Hall, I give you the honorable Kevin Hillard.”

  Martin watched the grainy FaceTime signal come up on the monitor. Kendra was watching the stream. She lifted her microphone. “327 live views.”

  “Citizens of San Diego and the world. I stand before you today with an update on the status of our community that is currently locked in a battle for survival. Despite what you might be reading, we are facing the worst ecological disaster in the history of this nation.”

  Carly jumped as the door opened. Paul Bingham stepped inside. “We have a big problem.”

  Kendra shook her head. “Now?”

  ***

  “Despite what you might be reading. We are facing the worst ecological disaster in the history of this nation.”

  General Redcrow cursed and pulled his headphones off, not wanting to listen any longer. They were almost there. Montgomery was lowering them straight down into a park beside the Horton Plaza mall. This was still one of the few open spots in downtown among the skyscrapers and thankfully it was just behind the NBC building.

  The wind and power of the helicopter landing was enough to topple chairs. They crushed a metal table as they lowered to the ground.

  The general turned to his half dozen troops.

  “No hesitation, boys, if it even looks infected you take the shot, you hear me?”

  “Sir, yes, sir!”

  ***

  The bank of TVs that normally monitored anywhere from four to nine news outlets at were all pictures of the mayor at a podium in the news center at city hall. Kendra watched Bingham, Carly and Martin running to the windows on the east side of the newsroom. A thundering sound was bouncing off the walls of the buildings downtown. It was like a small earthquake shook them.

  The windows looked out on the park plaza. The smoke swirled like a storm about to carry Dorothy away from Kansas. A massive military helicopter appeared and lowered itself to the ground crushing a table as it came down. She and Sally ate lunch at that table many times.

  Sally.

  A scream filled the office. Despite the rush of soldiers coming toward them and the mayor speaking on all the TV’s, it was the feral scream inside the building that got the attention. Kendra turned to watch the office door shake. Sally was inside pounding and screaming. She was fully infected now.