The others nodded and headed slowly to the cave entrance.
Mike noticed as they walked that if they had come this far out onto the asphalt, but to the right or the left of where they had ridden out the night, they would have ended up in the river sometime during the night. Tom and Kate were also looking over the destruction on either side of the cave entrance. Their eyes met briefly, acknowledging the apparent, and then turned to examine the entrance to the cave.
A few loose chunks of stone lay upon the ground, but the pile of loose brick seemed none the worse for the long night, seeming to Mike to be in the same place they had been. Not one brick had tumbled from the pile. How could that be, he asked himself. Tom voiced his thoughts.
“Those bricks look untouched,” he said it softly like such a thing could not possibly be true.
“I noticed that too,” Mike said aloud. Kate simply nodded, passed the pile by and stepped into the dark mouth of the cave.
Within a short time she located a box of matches, and lighting small little sticks of flame, found her way to one of the big heavy duty flashlights where it had rolled to a stop among a stack of canned goods that had shifted and toppled over from one of the wooden pallets.
Other than a very small amount of stone that had separated from the back wall, and a few more toppled piles of stored goods, the cave looked good.
“What do you think, Mike?” Tom asked.
It was one of the few things Tom had asked Mike's opinion about, and it surprised him.
“I think if it was going to come down, it would’ve already,” Mike assured him. Kate nodded her head in agreement.
The light-headedness was still with them as they moved about the shadowy interior. Kate set about building a small fire while Tom and Mike went out to help Bob bring Janet back into the cave.
Kate passed out bottled water and energy bars once everyone was back inside, and their stomachs seemed to settle down, but the water only woke the queasiness back up, and no one wanted to try the energy bars. They remained untouched.
~
Tom wandered back outside the cave, rested his head against the coolness of the stone that fronted the cave, and watched the sun in the sky. It described a crazy course across the sky and did not seem to pick up speed and become more stable as it headed for the Northeast.
Eventually Mike and Kate wandered out with coffee, bringing a cup for Tom. He sipped at it cautiously, but his stomach seemed to accept it better than it had the water earlier, and it did help to clear his head.
“Bob’s with Janet. They’re both sleeping,” Kate said between sips of coffee. She looked up at the sun where it
seemed to hang in the sky.
“It’s reversed,” Tom said. “Going backwards; or nearly backwards.”
Mike and Kate both nodded.
“Maybe this is it,” Mike said. Tom raised his eyebrows at him.
“It, as in maybe it’s done and finally about to start rotating in one direction. You know, stay that way.”
“Maybe that situation will straighten out the magnetic poles,” Kate said thoughtfully. “Maybe electronics, circuits, will work again.”
”Is that what it was,” Mike asked?
“Maybe,” Tom said.
“I don’t pretend to know,” Kate said. “Only the Earth wasn’t spinning right, or at all for awhile, and none of the electronic stuff worked. Maybe now it will.”
“Yeah. Yeah. But even after it started back up again nothing worked. At least not when we tried it,” Tom said.
“Did we?” Kate asked.
Tom looked puzzled.
“Hey, you know what? She’s right. We didn’t really check again. We just assumed it wouldn’t work. At least I didn’t check. I assumed it wouldn’t work. I mean it didn’t, why would it?” Mike asked. “Did you guys think the same thing?”
“I did,” Tom agreed “First day or two, but not after.”
Kate nodded in agreement. “If that’s what caused it, the Earth not really rotating, maybe it will work now. Or, maybe it’s something else,” she finished.
“That dust or ash,” Mike said. “I’ve never seen volcanic ash, but I’ve read about it, and it seems that’s what it was.”
“Yeah, I thought that also,” Kate said. “Really, if there weren’t volcanoes going off somewhere, I’d wonder. All this Earthquake activity, volcanoes just make sense. Wherever it happened, it worked its way here on the air and was dumped on us.”
They looked around at the nearly dry asphalt. Small areas steamed as the moisture made its way back into the air. Mike noticed that both Kate and Tom’s shirts were soaked through with sweat. His was no different.
“Yeah,” Tom agreed. “Getting hot.” Mike and Kate both shrugged. Who knows, the gestures said.
They all leaned back against the sun warmed stone, sipping at their coffee, watching the bloated sun stagger across the sky.
It was Kate who first noticed the small group walking across the steaming pavement towards them. Her gun seemed to magically appear in her right hand. Lying alongside her thigh, just out of sight.
~
Mike and Tom were nearly as quick getting their own guns into their hands, but not nearly as subtle.
“That’s close enough right there,” Tom said.
No one spoke for a moment. The two groups of people appraised one another carefully in the silence.
The group was small, four women, and two men. One of the men was no more than a boy, Mike though, but, after the shootout with the kids a few days prior, no one was about to take any kid lightly.
“We saw you from way back,” one of the women said. She pushed sweaty brown hair from her eyes as she spoke. “If we were meaning trouble…” She let the implication hang in the air.
As she finished, Kate raised her weapon from her side to let the group know she had also seen them, and had been ready for them. They smiled uneasily at one another. The woman held out her hands, and the others in the group did the same.
“We don’t want a problem,” she said softly. “I’m thinking you’re part of the group that took care of those kids from the north side the other day. We heard it.”
“If you could hear it, why didn’t you join in to help us?” Tom challenged.
“Good question,” Mike echoed softly.
The woman who had spoken first nodded. “We have two guns between us. One’s a twenty two rifle, the other is a Three Eighty which we only have eight bullets for. We didn’t realize how things were going to go bad so fast,” she looked up at the sky where the sun continued its curving, staggering climb. She looked back at Mike. “We just want to talk for now.”
Kate got to her feet, holstered her gun and walked towards the small group.
“Kate,” she said, holding out her hand.
“Patty,” The young dark haired woman answered. She turned to the others behind her. “Sandy, Nell, Tim, Lilly and,” she pointed to a young dark skinned man who was standing slightly back and apart, “That’s my man, Ronnie.”
As she finished the introductions, Bob and Janet came to the cave opening. Kate made the same introductions ending with Mike and making it clear he was also not available.
As her eyes caught Mike's, he seemed slightly amused by it. As she turned around, she poked her tongue out slightly at him and made a silly face as she walked towards him, inviting the others to sit down.
“Does that make me your bitch,” Mike whispered as she sat back down next to him.
“Ha, ha,” she whispered back. “…Bitch,” she giggled, but she didn’t allow the giggle to pass her lips. Mike stifled a laugh, but a smile rose to his face. He turned to the small group.
“We’ve got water inside, maybe some more coffee made, bottled soda.”
“Some coffee would be nice,” Patty said and smiled gratefully. Mike left for two cups of coffee and some bottled water as everyone began to sit down. The party had been traveling with backpacks and gear, and it came off now, making a small pile as they sat down. When M
ike returned just a few minutes later, the silence still held. He handed out the water and coffee and sat back down next to Kate. All eyes turned to him. He glanced over at Tom, but Tom seemed to be studying the small patch of asphalt at his feet. Mike found his voice.
“So…” He let the question hang, picked up his still warm coffee and took a reassuring sip.
Patty seemed to hesitate, so the girl she’d identified as Lilly spoke up. She flipped loose blond curls away from her face before she spoke.
“We want to join you,” she said finally in a quiet yet firm voice.
Patty, whose hands had been clasped tightly together, parted them and raised them to her shoulders palms up in a ‘there you go’ gesture.
Kate was amazed at how much Lilly looked like Lydia. She even sounded like her. It must be that age, Kate said to herself. Everyone acts alike. She looked over at Tom to see if he had noticed, but his eyes were already locked on the young woman. Patty continued.
“We’ve been living in a collapsed apartment building over off State Street. We couldn’t find anything better. Now that’s come the rest of the way down. To be honest, we’re afraid to go into any of the buildings. There’s a lumber shed over there, just a roof really. We spent most of last night under that trying to stay out of most of the weather. Not much to it. We figured we could get out quick enough if it came down.” She took a deep breath. “That’s where we’re at,” she finished.
When the girl finished speaking, Kate’s head was bowed as if in thought. She raised her head, met Patty’s eyes, and then the others one by one. She let her eyes wander around their own group. One by one they all nodded. Everyone on this side was for it; it was easy enough to see. Tom’s eyes were still on Lilly, so it was clear what his feelings were.
“You’re welcome here,” Kate said. A small chorus of welcome from the others echoed her own words. “There’s plenty of space here, and in a few months most of us will be leaving, so there will be more room after that.”
The small group of newcomers all seemed to heave a sigh of relief at the same time. Nervous laughter followed, and smiles lit up their faces.
Kate stood along with the others and motioned towards the mouth of the cave. “It isn’t much,” she said and laughed. “But it’s home.” The group picked up their gear and backpacks and followed her inside.
Mike ~ March 17th
It’s late, and it’s been a very tough few days here. We are eleven now, and I’ll get to that. We’ve also been through several more Earthquakes and aftershocks, rain, the world stopping, or being messed up worse. I guess I’ll start from the start, and you can compare it to your own experience. Maybe it will be helpful.
First yesterday, the sun never really rose at all. It barely came up and then went right back down. The night wasn’t too bad at first. It stormed, but then it got worse. Colder, harder rain, lightening, thunder, and then ash started falling from the sky.
That was crazy. But then the rain came down even harder later on and washed all the ash away. Then the earthquakes came. We had to leave the cave, we didn’t know if it would hold up or not. All around us things were crashing and collapsing. Our trucks are gone, fallen into the river. Swallowed up and gone. The road just washed away beneath them. If we had chosen there to wait out the storm…
We made it through to dawn though, but it wasn’t much of a dawn. The sun came up and has been staggering across the sky. It’s erratic. That’s the best description I can come up with. We think the Earth finally stopped and reversed. Or, maybe stopped again and reversed. The truth is, we don’t know. And, the way things are, I don’t think anyone else knows either.
We were all sic, light-headed, sick to our stomachs. It reminded me of going to the fair as a kid. I rode this ride that spun around in a circle. It made me sick, and I stayed sick for a few hours. It felt like that. Exactly like that.
The jury is out. The quakes have stopped, at least for now. Hopefully for good, but we don’t know if the Earth is done changing directions or even if that’s what it did.
So, we are eleven. We were joined by six people tonight. A young woman named Patty. She seems to be their leader, spokesperson. It seems to be like that now. Someone has to take control. No other way around it.
Patty is young. Maybe eighteen or nineteen, dark hair. Small but rugged looking… determined? I don’t know. Likable, that’s for sure. She and Ronnie are together.
Ronnie is her man (Her words), young too, dark brown skin. He was a carpenter. I like him. He’s quiet. Doesn’t say a lot,
but what he does say is worth hearing. I know that already.
Lilly is around the same age. She’s young, blond, looks so much like Lydia, even talks like her. It’s spooky. Tom is already attracted, you can see it, and she looks interested too. It seems unhealthy, or it could be, would be… I don’t know though. Tom has to live his life. The world is so different, but you know that.
Tim is just a kid, Patty’s brother. He worships Ronnie, you can see it in his eyes. Seems like a likable kid also.
Sandy is Native American, like Bob and Jan. Not from their people, but they clicked immediately, knew some of the same people back when the world was… well, the way it used to be. She’s a nurse; that’s like solid gold. How many nurses or doctors are there?
Nell is a small, Spanish woman. She looks to be in her twenties. She was stationed here with her husband, but he had left last month for overseas duty. She has no idea if he is okay.
They’re moved in. The cave is large, so eleven people is nothing. Plenty of room. Everything they owned or had was on their backs. They lost everything else when their building collapsed yesterday during the earthquakes and storms. So, it was pretty simple for them to move in.
Patty and Sandy have both asked about our plans for leaving, so later on we’ll probably sit down and talk about it. Nell and Lilly seem more interested in staying. Nell is afraid to leave the area, as if her husband could some how get back here, and if he did this is where he would look for her. It seems unreasonable to me, but she has the idea in her head. There doesn’t seem to be a way to shake it, at least not yet. Lilly is captivated by Tom. Tom has never made any bones about the fact that he doesn’t want to leave. This gives him someone to be with him. I suppose that’s a good thing.
We knew there were people around, but in the last few days it seems like we’ve met both the bad and the good. I would like to meet more, but no more bad ones.
Kate ~ March 17th (Late)
I know Mike has written tonight, much earlier, so I won’t go over the same things that I assume he wrote. It’s been a nasty couple of days, and we don’t know if the bad things are over or not. We have new people with us. I really like Patty. I can talk to her, and it’s been awhile, even back in the world, since I’ve been close to another woman like that. Relationships seem to form fast now. It’s just the way of the new world. We’re just taking life as it comes, at face value I guess. There are no directions for us.
Patty, her man and her brother have decided to stay. They also decided they’ll leave when Mike and I do. They don’t want to face a North Country winter in a cave. We are not cave people and don’t want to be. But we talked about that too. We may end up in some other cave. It could be the quakes have caused devastation everywhere. If so where else would it be safe? We talked a lot. We talked ourselves out. There’s always tomorrow to talk some more.
If the day is anything like normal tomorrow, we may go out looking for vehicles. Ours were swept into the river during the storm. We’ll see what’s left.
After the meeting broke up, I spent some time talking to Jan, another woman I became instantly close to when all that I had was this notebook and a gun to depend on. She really likes Sandy. Sandy is enthusiastic about returning to the land. So are Bob and Jan. I think returning to the land is fine, except a mowed lawn is okay also. I guess there are no more lawns to be mowed though.
I gave my father's gun to Lilly. I don't know why I did that. I th
ought that it meant something to me, but whatever that was has passed on. She noticed it, liked it. I showed her how to shoot it; what was left to do? Besides, and I'm being honest, after this stuff with Lydia, after having to shoot someone, I decided I'd rather put on another forty five. I have an exact mate to the one I was wearing on me already. I picked it up the other day. I asked myself tonight, would it have made a difference if I was wearing it the other day? One on each side? Well I am now. It makes me feel safer, more ready to deal with whatever comes at me.
Anyway, Jan and Bob turned in, as did Sandy. Mike’s long gone to sleep, and I’ve been sitting here thinking about the last few days, thinking about Lydia… everything. So, I wrote something. If I had a guitar (I intend to get one) I’d put it to music. I have the music in my head. I have, had, a note book full of little songs that I wrote. Sometimes I would get ideas once a week, sometimes a few a day. They just showed up. I would see or feel something, and it would come out as a song. Some people do that with stories. It's the same isn't it? Writing is writing.
I heard more than once I should do something with them. Maybe I would have made a better singer/guitarist than dancer? It's all art isn't it. Maybe I'll resurrect some of those lyrics when I have the time. Meanwhile I'll write them out as they come to me.
It’s a new world, rust falling from the skies
It’s a new world, scales fallen from my eyes.
Everything gone in the blink of an eye,
got time to hurt, but no time to cry.
Got to keep moving just to stay alive,
take it day by day and try to survive.
It’s a new world, death calling from the cities empty streets.
It’s a new world, mind skipping, heart missing beats.
Life passing by in the space of a dream,
moving too fast to know what it might mean.
Changes and changes, new every day,
looking for answers, don’t know which direction they lay.
It’s a new world, got my heart in your hand.
It’s a new world, time’s spinning through my fingers like sand.
Yeah It’s a new world, rust falling from the skies
The Rising of the Dead Page 10