The End The Beginning (Humanity's New Dawn Book 1)

by Ryan Horvath

  “Yes, I believe I do. It provides heat and light to this surface we are on,” she replied.

  “That’s right!” Jack said. “And that surface we are on is called the Earth.”

  “But neither the Sun nor the Earth is the Moon, Jack,” River observed.

  “Yes, that’s right. Okay, the Earth is moving around the Sun at all times. We can’t feel it, but trust me, it is happening. So, much like the Earth is moving around the Sun, the Earth also has an object that moves around it as well,” Jack continued.

  “And that object is the Moon, Jack?” River queried.

  “Yes. That’s correct. We usually only see it at night but sometimes it is visible in the day,” Jack said.

  “Is the Moon big, round, and white, Jack?” River continued.

  “Yes, River. It is,” he answered.

  “Oh, okay, thank you, Jack. I have seen the Moon many times,” River meowed.

  “Good. So in a solar eclipse, the Moon passes between the Sun and the Earth. The day gets dark. Not dark like night but depending on the totality of the eclipse it can get fairly dark.” Jack suddenly couldn’t believe he was teaching a cat about eclipses. It was strange but also amusing. “Do you understand?”

  “Yes, Jack,” River acknowledged. “Thank you, Jack. Now what does virus mean?”

  Just then, Brian entered the kitchen. He was wrapped at the waist in a towel and using another smaller towel to dry his hair.

  “Jack, are you talking to that cat?” he asked with bewilderment.

  Jack looked like a cornered mouse as he gaped at his friend unsure what to say. The cat on the window sill jumped down and approached Brian. As she had done with Jack, she wound herself around Brian’s legs and purred.

  Jack laughed. “She likes you,” he said.

  The cat meowed up to Brian and Jack said, “She says ‘hello.’”

  “So you are talking to this cat.” Brian stated it this time rather than asking.

  “Well, yes. I suppose I am.” Jack looked embarrassingly down at his feet. When he looked back up River was seated in front of Brian and looking up at him. She turned to Jack and meowed. To Brian, Jack said “She wants to know what your name is.”

  Brian knelt down and scratched the cat on the cheek which she appreciated by rubbing harder into his fingers, squinting her eyes and purring louder.

  “I’m Brian,” he said to the cat.

  The cat meowed and Jack said, “She says her name is…”

  But Brian interrupted. “River.”

  Jack looked at his friend and one time love with stupefied amazement. “You can understand her too?”

  “No, no. I mean yes. Wait. I don’t understand her meows but I can hear them,” Brian said wonderingly.

  “Hear them how?” Jack asked. River was also looking at Brian with evident curiosity.

  “I can hear them from inside your head, Jack. I can understand her through you.” Brian revealed.

  Jack stared at his friend with awe and Brian stared back with confusion. They held each other’s gaze for twenty seconds before Brian broke the silence. “How is that possible, Jack.”

  “I don’t know, Bri,” Jack answered. “But it turns out a lot of new things are possible. For instance, I think I hear Ian on his way down the hall.”

  Seconds later, Ian entered the room to join Jack, Brian and River. “Did I hear a cat in here while I was sleeping?” And then he noticed River sitting near Brian.

  River meowed three quick mews.

  Jack and Brian both said to Ian, “She says ‘Hi, I’m River. What’s your name?” They looked at each other and both burst out laughing for having said this in unison.

  “Uh,” Ian looked from his two friends to the cat and back to his two friends. Jack nodded to him. “Uh, I’m Ian,” he finished this time.

  The cat meowed.

  Jack translated, “It’s nice to meet you.”

  And with that, River sauntered over to a perplexed Ian and began to wind herself between his legs.

  Yes she thought to herself. These three will do just fine.

  18

  ART

  On the Monday evening following the incident that occurred in Art Spektor’s DC residence bathroom, Art found himself stalking new prey.

  He had spent some time this morning exploring his newly discovered ability. He found he could easily lift every piece of furniture in his apartment over his head with only one hand but that wasn’t much of a feat as most of his furnishings were fairly small. So he decided to try the refrigerator. He slid it from the wall with little effort from one hand and unplugged it. It took both his hands to keep it balanced but he lifted it nonetheless. The ceilings in his domicile were high enough to allow him to do an overhead press with the refrigerator. Up and down and up and down, he raised and lowered it while the few contents inside rattled in protest at their new uprooted positions.

  He set the refrigerator back on its proper end and returned it to its spot and plugged it back in. He wondered what the average weight of a refrigerator was. Four hundred pounds maybe? His fridge would definitely be considered smaller than average. He guessed it at around three hundred pounds or less. His face wore a devilish smile.

  He gazed around his home looking for something bigger than his ice box that he could try but instead of something bigger, he spied something smaller. It was a phone book for the DC area. He walked over to it and picked up the tome by its bound side. He tore through the book as if it were one sheet of paper instead of several hundred stacked together.

  He walked back into his kitchen, tossed the phone book halves in the recycle bin with a thud, and stepped over to the window. He looked out and down toward the alley below. It was deserted of people. There were dumpsters and recycle bins for the various businesses and residences. There were also a handful of vehicles: a large sport utility vehicle and three four-door sedans, one of them his own. He knew what he wanted to do next.

  Art left his residence through the front door and proceeded down the two flights of stairs to the street level. Outside, he walked to and stood before his vehicle. His was probably the largest of the sedans. He stepped to the front passenger side of the car and opened the door. In the car, he opened the glove box and checked his registration. His car weighed thirty six hundred pounds. He surmised that most of that weight was in the front of the car because of the dashboard, engine, and transmission.

  Art wasn’t for sure but he thought probably two thirds of the car’s weight was in the front. He got out of the car, closed the door, and stepped back and stood facing the trunk. He clapped his hands together and rubbed them for a few seconds. Art leaned over and placed his hands, palms up under the rear fender, and lifted.

  For the second time in less than a day, Art fell back, having torn the rear bumper of his car clean off.

  “Shit,” he spat out as he looked at his damaged vehicle. The fender was lying across his legs. He moved it off of him and produced his key fob from his pants pocket and silenced the car alarm that had incited beeping when the bumper came off. He looked back at the rear of his car.

  Art now noticed he could see more of the innards of the car now that the fender had been displaced and the vehicle’s frame was now in view. He intended to continue trying what he came out here for.

  He grabbed two parts of the frame of the rear of the vehicle and applied upward force as if he were doing a bicep curl. The car reacted but only by raising off its shocks about an inch. He relaxed and the vehicle sank back down.

  Gearing up, Art tried again, this time he used a lot of effort from his arms, back, and legs. And this time, he was rewarded. With strain and a guttural groan, Art lifted the hind end of his car about eight inches off the ground and held it there counting off seconds.

  Art was sweating profusely, threads were standing out on his neck, and there were visible veins throbbing around his temples but he held fast. Twenty seconds later, he set the car back down and it bounced a few times on its shocks.


  Art stepped back and sat down hard next to his dislocated fender with a heavy relaxing gasp but also with a wary smile. Sweat was running down his face and stinging his eyes.

  When Art started to feel cooled down and to feel his heart rate slowing down, he stood up, walked to the front of the car and squatted to peer around the bumper. He would not make the same mistake twice by grabbing onto the bumper. Art located two places he could grab onto and tried lifting, again with all his effort, and again, using the strength of his arms, back, and legs. The car creaked and bounced on its shocks but did not come off the ground.

  Art strained and pressed and groaned but he could not lift the front end of the car. He could tell the front was considerably heavier than the rear and speculated that perhaps his initial assessment of the weight distribution of an automobile had been inaccurate. He stopped trying to lift and stepped away from the front end of his car and back to the rear. He picked up his severed bumper, opened the trunk and threw it inside.

  He returned indoors to his home and stripped off all of his clothes as he walked toward the bathroom. He stopped to check himself again in the full length mirror. The muscle gain had either slowed or stopped. He’d added, he estimated, about ten percent more muscle since yesterday when he’d first noticed. And as he touched it, he found the tissue to be very solid.

  But now, he looked like he did ten years ago when he was nineteen. Any sign that he had ever shown of aging was mysteriously gone. Art didn’t know how it was possible.

  He showered the sweat off and dressed in fresh clothes.

  He was very hungry so he decided to walk around the block to the all you can eat Chinese buffet. Once there, he took advantage and the owners of the restaurant lost money on this particular lunch guest. Art ate three large helpings of sweet and sour chicken, two behemoth sized servings of spicy Szechuan beef, four egg rolls, six pan fried pot stickers, and two bowls of egg drop soup. He washed this all down with six trips to the self-service soda fountain for cola and lemon-lime soda. This gorge took him less than forty-five minutes and when he was through and sated, he left the restaurant and returned home where he fell asleep for a few hours.

  Later, awake and on the prowl just after dusk, Art had just picked up his next target. He was standing outside an apartment building not his own when he saw the woman across the street. She was petite and blonde and most importantly, alone. Another check in the “helpful column” for Art was that she was talking on her cell phone.

  Art allowed her to pass and then crossed the street and fell in behind her. They were separated by a distance of maybe fifteen feet but with Art’s longer legs and quicker stride he had no doubt that he could close the gap in time. As Art had been here a while before the woman appeared, he knew the building she was going to pass in front of next was empty and that was where he intended to take her.

  Just as she passed the building’s entrance, which Art had previously made sure was unlocked, Art snatched her wrapping his arm around the front of her neck and using his other hand to cover her mouth. The woman dropped her cell phone beside her as she struggled against Art’s assault and Art quickly pulverized it with a stomp, terminating the call and the cell phone’s life.

  Art pulled the woman backwards into the dark building, her arms and legs flailing helplessly. He set her down and went to spin her around by grabbing her by the arm. But he grabbed too hard. He felt the woman’s right humorous crack several times beneath his powerful hand and she shrieked in agony. Art pulled his hand back and there were several broken bone fragments jutting out of the flesh of her arm.

  The woman howled and moved slowly back from Art but it was dark and she didn’t know she was going further into the building. She tried to cradle her wounded appendage but clearly didn’t know how to take care of the miasma that used to be her right arm. Blood poured from it and ran in rivulets off her hand onto the floor.

  Art realized that the woman was going to go into shock and pass out soon. It was unfortunate that his fifty-eighth victim was going to expire so quickly. He would have liked to have had more time with her.

  Art stepped quickly to the weeping, whimpering woman and grabbed her by the neck and squeezed, hard, deliberately. The bones in the woman’s petite neck snapped in Art’s hand and blood poured from her mouth, nose, and ears. Her life was over.

  Art tossed her corpse away into the shadows fifteen feet away. If anyone found her, they would find her with her head turned nearly one hundred and eighty degrees from its intended location.

  “Damn,” Art said in the darkness. “I guess I don’t know my own strength.” He chuckled. “But I’ll figure it out!”

  19

  AMANDA, KAREN, AND BLAZE

  As afternoon started to approach evening on Monday, Amanda sat quietly and thoughtfully in the back seat of the taxi. Her sister, Karen, had sounded strange on their last call. Amanda supposed it was grief and stress. Even though she had never been married herself, Amanda could not imagine losing someone she’d known for over twenty years. Hell, Amanda had known Jack Thomas nearly as long as her sister. She had even had a brief crush on him in her late teens when she had first met him but she’d been able to see a look in her sister’s eyes that said Karen thought this young man was her one and only. It turned out to be true and Amanda was genuinely happy for her sister.

  Amanda would miss Jack. She loved and respected her brother-in-law and was proud that he was one of the few good politicians out there. Jack had always been good to Amanda as well and he would often visit when Karen did.

  Her thoughts turned to the crazy green eyed man. She was fairly convinced of this man’s guilt in her brother-in-law’s homicide but who was he? Why did he kill Jack? Why was she seeing him? And the worst: why was he chasing her and her sister? All questions, no answers.

  Amanda tried to relax in the seat of the cab but couldn’t. Her thoughts were too active and the whiskey she had on the plane had worn off.

  About twenty minutes later, the cab had arrived at its destination in Great Falls. It was about 5:30 and the last of the investigators had cleared out of the Thomas residence. Amanda looked over toward the house of her sister’s neighbors where some official vehicles still sat.

  Amanda paid, tipped, and thanked the cabbie and got out of the car. As she got close to the front steps, the front door opened and Karen came bouncing quickly down the short set of stairs. She looked better than Amanda would have expected a new widow to look.

  “Amanda!” Karen exclaimed as she opened up her arms wide and approached her sister. Amanda made a similar motion.

  They finally met and held each other tightly.

  “Thank you so much for coming,” Karen said through a happy sob.

  “Of course, Karen. I can’t let you be alone for this. How are you? You look… well… good,” Amanda said.

  “I’m better now that you’re here. I was worried. How was the trip?” Karen asked.

  “It was uneventful,” Amanda lied. She didn’t want to burden her sister with the details of the unusual and unpleasant images of the green eyed man. She knew that would have to come up eventually but not in the first few minutes of seeing her sister the day after her husband was gunned down. The two sisters separated but continued to hold hands and looked at each other. “What have you been doing today?” Amanda asked her sister.

  Karen looked uneasy, her eyes darting away from her sister’s. “Well, it’s been kind of a crazy day but mostly, I been getting Jack’s funeral arrangements ready. The service will take place on Saturday,” she said. Karen had no idea that no such service would take place.

  “Sis, you shouldn’t be doing that by yourself. In fact, let me finish it up for you,” Amanda offered.

  “Thank you, Amanda, but remember what I do for a living,” Karen reminded. “Most of the folks at my office had already got the ball rolling. The announcement for the service was drawn up and ready to post, they just needed the date. We have a few caterers on our go-to list that are good at last
minute events. Jack had already selected the crematorium he wanted to use, so I just had to schedule the time for that.”

  “Cremated?” Amanda questioned. She wanted to tiptoe around this subject. “Um… isn’t that premature? They haven’t found his killer yet.”

  “I guess when you’re a United States Congressman, you get special treatment even in death,” Karen replied. “For whatever reason, they expect to have his body cleared of evidence by Friday morning. They are releasing him to me that afternoon.”

  “Ok, well, what can I do?” Amanda asked her older sister.

  Karen smiled at her younger sibling, “Come inside. Have a drink with me. I’m just really glad to see you.” Karen embraced her sister again and Amanda returned her hug. But this time, she noticed something behind Karen that startled her.

  It was a Dalmatian. With one green eye and one blue.

  Amanda felt a million spider legs run up and down her spine. She pulled back from her sibling.

  “Karen…,” she began warily, “when did you get that dog?”

  Karen turned around and saw Blaze standing behind her.

  “Oh. Amanda, this is Blaze,” Karen said without answering Amanda’s question.

  Amanda looked at the dog. He winked his green eye at her and barked.

  Karen searched her sister for any kind of reaction to Blaze’s bark. She detected nothing. She did, however, detect something else from her sister: apprehension. It almost looked as though Amanda was afraid of Blaze.

  “When did you get that dog?” Amanda repeated.

  Karen did not like the inflection Amanda put on the word “that.”

  “Well, today as a matter of fact. A few hours ago. He belongs… belonged,” she corrected, “to my next door neighbors. I’m sort of dog sitting until someone comes to claim him.”

  Blaze chuffed and looked at Karen as if that was the silliest bit of nonsense he’d heard all day.