by Mark Tufo
For more about Leigh and her work, visit her website at http://www.cerebralwriter.com.
Also by Leigh M. Lane:
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In this highly anticipated conclusion to the World-Mart trilogy, George once again travels beyond the district in search of any surviving family. What he finds along the way, however, changes everything he thought he'd known about the world—and the end of the world—as he knows it.
Available Aftermath Beyond World-Mart.
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And before World-Mart and Aftermath:
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The world of corporate greed runs rampant after the government collapses, leaving police, fire, and social services in the hands of the wealthy. Debtor prisons for the lower and middle classes overflow and quarantine camps have filled to capacity, turning the streets into a personal battleground for terrorists fighting against a world headed toward ruin as resources run dry and civilization becomes ruled by The Private Sector.
"A versatile literary maestro, Lane's characters breathe, her language sings, and her plotting is nothing short of remarkable. You owe it to yourself to give her a read, no matter what kind of fiction you like. You'll love her work. I promise." –Trent Zelazny, Nightmare Award-winning author of Fractal Despondency and Butterfly Potion
"In the tradition of 1984, Leigh M. Lane delivers a terrifying vision of the future—a horrific future that may not be so distant after all…." –Lisa Mannetti, Stoker Award-Winning author of The Gentling Box and Deathwatch
Available The Private Sector.
A New World: Chaos by John O’Brien
Chapter 119
Picking Up The Kids
Stepping out into the cool air, carrying my 12-gauge pump shotgun, I slide my Beretta 9mm into the speed draw holster at my side. To the animals around, it is just another day. The doves and blue jays, sitting on the feeder, eyeball the seeds scattered on the ground. Several crows sit on the branches of the tall fir and cedar trees and take flight at my approach. One crow, taking up station on the tallest branch of a tree, calls out a warning. A squirrel sits on a rock wall watching me, picking up sunflower seeds and holding them between its hands.
“What’s up, little bro?” I ask, walking down the gravel drive toward my Jeep.
The sound of gravel crunches under my hiking boots and adds to the surreal feel of the day and the past events. I am still having a hard time coming to grips with the situation and the speed of it all. However, anxiety and worry over the kids overrides any stray thoughts or ability to focus on anything else. Even the blue sky overhead and the sun shining on the trees, casting its light on the tops, sending rays through gaps in the branches, fails to bring its usual inner calmness and peace. No, I wasn’t going to be taking the top down on the Jeep, driving around with Iron Maiden blaring and enjoying this beautiful day.
I open the tailgate and slide the shotgun in with the business end to the rear. After verifying that I have duct tape, I continue by doing a walk around, checking tires, hood latches, and such. This would be the wrong time to get stranded on the road for some stupid reason. The hood latches receive special attention. I remember the New Year’s party at a friend’s house; a night of drinking, fireworks, good times followed by some couch time. Then, there was the drive home in the morning. Several miles down the road, my windshield was suddenly filled with a wonderful close-up view of my hood. The bang alone was enough to drain my adrenal glands for a month. I do not want second helpings of that if I can avoid it.
I climb in and set my Beretta next to me, verifying that a full mag awaits should I need it, and crank my baby up. The fuel reads half of a tank, which is good enough for what I have to do now, but I make a mental note to stock gas cans and siphoning equipment. Starting down the road, I pick up my cell to see the magical bars and service. I have no idea how long this will last, but I’m thankful it is at least working now. I call Robert back.
“Hey, Dad,” my son whispers on the other end.
“Are you still down in the basement with Brianna and Nicole?” I ask.
“Yes.”
“Okay, stay there and don’t make any noise whatsoever. Is your phone on vibrate?”
“Yes.”
“Okay, and both Nic’s and Bri’s phone are now turned off?”
“Yes.”
“Any changes since we talked?” I ask, thankful I am still able to talk with them.
They are okay for now, and most importantly, still alive.
“I heard someone walking around upstairs again and banging on the basement door just a couple of minutes ago. It’s all quiet now,” he says, still whispering, but I can hear the worry in his voice.
I have had the privilege of being this boy’s dad for seventeen years and know him well. Also, I know that Bri, sitting beside him, though scared, will keep her head. Always thinking, that one is. In all of her fifteen years, I have yet to see the gears in her head slow down or not be working. I can visualize Nic sitting there comforting her, keeping her own fears internal, and worrying more about making sure Bri is okay. They are all so precious, I love them like no other. They mean the world to me.
“I’m on my way. Don’t move or make any noise. Don’t talk to each other. Become a black hole in the basement there. No lights, and make sure the light from your phone doesn’t show. You’ll most likely hear noise when I get there, but you’re not to move or call out or come upstairs until I call for you. You got it?” I say, wishing I was there now.
“Okay, Dad.”
“Tell the girls I’m on the way and not to worry.”
“Okay.”
“I’m going to go now to save our juice. I’ll be there shortly. I love you, Robert! Tell Nic and Bri I love them.”
“I love you too, Dad!” Robert replies, and then, there’s the click and dead silence of the call ending.
Driving down the country road, it really does not seem all that different. There are not many cars traveling here, even during normal times. The day seems like any other except for the anxiety inside and the impatience of wanting to be at their house now. Across a green field to the left, the sun sparkles off a small inlet as it makes its way to Puget Sound, the water lapping high on the shoreline. Ahead, two doe graze by the side of the road, raising their heads to look in my direction before leaping into the trees.
I reach the Highway, and it is here that things begin to seem out of the ordinary. There’s not a car moving on the road. A couple are angled off the road and some sit in the grassy median between the north- and southbound lanes, but not a thing is moving. It is an eerie setting with the gray lanes stretching away to both sides like some futuristic, post-apocalyptic scene.
Looking north, the peaks of the Olympic Mountains, majestic in the distance with snow still residing on their tops, bask in the sun pouring down on them. They continue on with their existence as if it were any other day. The trees alongside the highway tell the same story; nature continuing along just as if nothing out of the ordinary is happening or happened. I feel very small at this particular moment.
The only things moving are a few columns of dark smoke drifting above the trees in the distance, but it doesn’t appear like anything large is on fire. I wish I had more firepower, but that is a worry for later. First and foremost come the children.
Turning north, I head toward them. The roads are amazingly clear. Not like the zombie apocalypse books I have been reading where the roads were clogged with ‘impossible to bypass’ jams. With the sickness, I guess everyone went home. After all, where else would you go when you have the flu? I imagine the cars off to the side were those trying to get elsewhere when they were overcome. There are some shadows silhouetted through the glass as I pass by, an indication of bodies within. Cresting a hill, one body lies face down in the grass by the side of the road. The once-white summer dress that clings to it appears dirty or stained.
Ten minutes later, I turn off the highway onto the ramp leading to the north end of town. Taking a right at the e
nd of the ramp, I glance over to the Walmart. There’s barely a car in the lot. Besides the lack of cars on the highway, this is the biggest change I have witnessed yet and adds to the overall weirdness of the day. Normally, the lot would be full. It didn’t matter what time of it was, the lot was always full. I often wondered who these people were that crowded the store at all times of the day.
Didn’t they work? I would think.
Ahead is an intersection with a blinking red traffic light which I pass without pause; I mean, who is going to pull me over now? The blinking light tells me the electricity is still working, by some alternate emergency method. I’ll have to figure that out later. The local power is provided by hydroelectric means from a plant a few miles up the road, but whether the plant is still operating or not is anyone’s guess. The Fred Meyer on the other side is the same. It is as if everyone has been removed from earth and left only the monuments to technology and capitalism behind. The only living thing in sight is the occasional bird flying overhead or sitting on power lines. The eerie feeling I’ve had since pulling onto the highway grows and becomes more intense.
“Okay, time to focus,” I say to myself.
I pass the high school next to the Walmart and glance at my 9mm for reassurance. There are three mags in my pockets aside from the one loaded. Fourteen rounds at my immediate beck and call with a further forty-two on back up. I always load my mags one round shy in order not to lose spring compression. In my opinion, it would totally suck to have a round not chamber due to a lack of force, especially just when you would have truly enjoyed having that round available. Besides the Remington 870 in the back, a folding blade rests in my front pocket and my boot knife is in place. I can use either with a fair degree of skill, but I prefer to have the distance variable on the uphill side – the more, the merrier.
My anxiety both increases and decreases as I draw closer to the house where my kids are hiding. Action time is coming and I am almost there. I want to get things done rather than have anything linger or wait. I remember the physical fitness runs in the Air Force. There was always a lot of milling around and taking time, stalling before the actual start. I would think, Come on! Let’s just get this started and over with!
A couple of turns later, I pull in front of the house. It is similar to others in the neighborhood; most are two-story structures with the occasional single-story in between. The only major difference in the homes is the color: A tan one here, a darker brown there, and several in differing shades of blue. It is a small neighborhood on an oval, track-shaped road with only fifty or so houses in the entire community. Built on the edge of town, it is surrounded on all sides by trees, their tips showing above the roofs. High-voltage power lines across the street stand tall, their usual hum gone.
Shutting down the Jeep, I leave the keys on the seat in case the kids are able to get out, and, well, I am not. Robert has driven the Jeep a few times and can manage to get it somewhere without involving trees or having a parked car intervene with his progress.
I feel the warmth of the sun on my back as I holster my 9mm and grab the duct tape from the rear seat, along with two flashlights. One is a silver monster with a bell-shaped light compartment, and the other is a nice little LED I picked up from GI Joe’s a few years back. Well, it was GI Joe’s before it became just Joe’s, and then, it became nothing. The small flashlight is almost perfectly suited to attach to the shotgun. I attach it to the barrel, not feeling a bit embarrassed about my liberal use of duct tape. The idea is to keep the light aligned with the barrel rather than venturing off on its own if I bump into something, or from the recoil if I need to send massed pellets outward.
Grabbing the 870, I load the magazine, putting one in the chamber giving me five shots, and head to the front of the Jeep. They just moved here, so I have little intel on the house or on whatever these things have become. The front of the house has a large window built of smaller panes. A porch runs in front of the house and around the corner to the right where the front door is located. This is overhung by the upstairs, where two facing windows stare darkly back at me. The front must contain a downstairs living room, and most houses like this have a kitchen opening to the right with a central hallway running through the middle to a bathroom in the back or rooms off the hall. The stairs up will likely be close to the living room with bedrooms upstairs. The top floor windows facing me are most likely bedrooms with either one or two more in the back and a bathroom. The basement door should be close to the kitchen or possibly in the back, most likely under the stairwell.
As to what happened to the people who fell ill but didn’t die, well, I don’t know much about them. I don’t know what their capabilities are, or what transformations might have taken place. All I know from reading online news articles is that they are extremely aggressive and attack on sight. There were reports of them attacking and killing others, some even mentioning cannibalism. Everything has happened so fast. Another thing I remember reading is they may have an aversion to light. No ideas as to why were offered. I guess there hadn’t been enough time for anyone to have figured out these things.
What was discussed was that there had been some sort of genetic mutation on a DNA level. Some articles ventured that higher cognitive abilities or vestiges of self-awareness had been burned away, perhaps from the onset of the high fevers or from the genetic changes themselves. I really don’t have the faintest idea. I have some guesses, but that is all they are…guesses.
Their aversion to light might be from a sensitivity of the eyes to ultraviolet rays, solar radiation, a general aversion to birds chirping, or just a dislike of the color green for all I know. The only reports that were consistent is that not one of these transformed things has ever been observed in daylight. All I know is that one of them is possibly in the house with my kids, and I am going to get them out.
It is amazing how lightning fast thoughts are flying through my mind. I finish with these meandering flashes and push away from the Jeep. I want to just rush in and grab the kids, but I have to take the time to do this right or I will do more harm than good. It has been a while since I have done something like this and never with the stakes so high. I just hope I am still as good as I once was.
Okay, entry. The two-car garage to the left the house is a no go. There are several cars in the driveway, which alludes to the possibility that the garage is being used as storage and that means clutter. The additional possibility that there is a garage door opener makes opening the doors from the outside a difficult option. My options are, therefore, the front door, the back door, the front window, or one of the upstairs windows.
I know from years with my ex-wife that the doors are most likely barricaded leaving either the upstairs or the front window. Age seems to have made me a touch lazier, so I do not really want to scale the roof. Plus, if I have to make a quick exit, that would mean I would have to jump from the roof, leaving my knees either a permanent fixture on the lawn or shooting across the street to blast through one of the windows. I like my knees where they are, so that leaves the front window.
Tucking the large flashlight in my waistband and cradling my shotgun, I start across the lawn. Climbing onto the porch and staying away from the window, I approach from the wall side so as not to cast a shadow across the panes. With my back to the wall, I listen for any sound. Nothing…absolute dead silence. Even the birds seem to have left this zone of tension. Drapes are pulled across the windows, so I can’t see far into the room. Keeping my ears open, I ease down to the corner of the window and slowly move to see if I can catch a glimpse of the inside through a crack in the curtains. No luck.
It looks as though I am going to go into this blind. This is certainly not like times past when I always had the tools to do the job and didn’t have to break through a window like I was in some Chuck Norris flick. In the movies, the heroes have more tools, weapons, and training than they knew what to do with; yet, they would all eventually crash through a window on the end of a rope.
R
eally?!!!
I’ll try the doors first because you never know. Easing around the porch to the front door, I keep my footfalls light, staying on the balls of my feet, slowly increasing my weight with each step, testing for creaky boards. There’s no window on this side, so I don’t have to worry about being seen from inside. Reaching the front door, I stay against the wall and try the door handle. Yep, locked. I leave the porch and walk around to the back door, making sure to keep under the windows, while keeping an eye on the neighboring houses just to make sure I am not in for any surprises. My head is moving in a constant slow swivel. Reaching the corner of the house, I kneel, surveilling the backyard looking for movement or any indication that I am not alone and feel slightly foolish for playing commando. But the kids said someone was in the house, and I keep that and the recent events clear in my mind.
Looking along the backside of the house, a small basement window is set into the foundation at ground level. Robert was right. There is no way they could fit through that. Crouched, I ponder whether I should peer in to let them know I am here or if this would startle them and cause them to make noise. As much as I dearly ache to see them, even with a quick glimpse through a small window, I don’t want to jeopardize their situation any more than it is.
Rising, I ease along the back of the house, checking my shadow so as not to cast one across the window. I sidle up to the back door and test the knob. It’s locked with curtains drawn, preventing a view within. I peek in the window corner. Nothing. At least here, though, I am able to see below the curtains and it is pitch black inside. A thin ray of light hits the floor through the small opening but that is it. Back to plan A.
As I turn to leave the back door, I hear a faint scuffling and a very low growl. It is so low that I am not even sure I heard it, but in the absolute silence of the world around me, it rings like a bell inside my head. So, if there is anything inside, it seems to be on the ground floor…at least for now. I follow my path back to the front porch.