4POCALYPSE - Four Tales Of A Dark Future

by Brian Fatah Steele

  Jasmine started to speak but Dooriya slid a picture over to her. “That’s a picture of your grandmother. Dress like her, wear your hair like her, act like her, be her, and maybe, just maybe people will believe you are a gypsy. They thought she was a gypsy when she came up here from Dallas and then Oklahoma City.”

  “Uh, Aunt Doori, grandma was a Gypsy.” She chuckled. “We’re Rom, we’re all Gypsies.”

  Dooriya then slid the tarot cards over to her. “Who cares? People seem to think gypsies are non-confrontational, some even believe they have that special foresight—” She grinned, looking pointedly into Jasmine’s eyes. “That’s the only picture I have and I want it back, okay?”

  Jasmine nodded, but inside she was becoming both excited and frightened. Since her father was murdered, she wanted to go after this guy. He was the world’s largest producer and distributor of illegal drugs. The same drug the junkie was on when he cut her father’s throat. The method of distribution was so well guarded the police failed at every attempt to insert a plant or even to learn where the drugs entered the city. They literally did not have a clue as to whom or how.

  “Your mother would be proud of you,” Dooriya said while taking Jasmine’s hand. “She was like you, wanting to right all the wrongs.” Dooriya stopped and blew her nose. “She was supposed to leave Pakistan a week before the impact but was called back... No one imagined that the cities would implode on impact...”

  “Hell,” Baul said, “No one knew it was going hit where it did. Every one believed it was going to be a direct hit into the Indian Ocean.” He shook his head. “A mathematical error. Of all things...”

  Jasmine looked at the pictures, the map, and finally the small notebook. “Friend of yours?” She asked, flipping the page, looking for anything else that might have been written on the page.

  “His name is Owen. That’s all I know... He owns the majority of the gangs, uh, the red gangs. Kill him first.”

  Chapter 6

  Although it took Jasmine over a month, she had a relatively easy trek through Kansas. The entire Kansas Gendarmerie police force was rooting for her and helping her along the way. She traveled on a refurbished Electro Glide that looked worse than what it really was to prevent theft. Something a poor gypsy might own. Something no one else would want to own. In Kansas, she had monetary credits to afford a room in a hotel or contacts to stay in the barracks or another police officer’s home. The Gendarmerie police kept her secret. There wasn’t one who would betray her or wasn’t behind what she was trying to do. However, in front of her were fifty bare miles between the Kansas exit and the Oklahoma entrance. Fifty miles and three rebel camps to cross before she could return to safety, before she’d meet up with the Oklahoma State Gendarmerie force. They knew she was coming but did not, and would not send an escort or anyone to protect her. They wished her well and supported her but she was on her own.

  Through her binoculars, Jasmine saw the spikes that held several skulls in different stages of decay. The newest was a woman’s skull. Her hair, although mostly clotted with blood, blew north, most strands completely horizontal. Her expression was still frozen in the middle of a scream. Seeing this, it was hard to believe people still snuck out. Obviously, leaving underground was worth the risk of dying.

  The first rebel camp was maybe five miles from the spikes and she’d have to come close to them in order to stay in the few remaining trees left. Trees that had somehow survived the impact, then the years of torrid weather, and finally the people that lived above ground and generally took a tree to survive starvation and freezing. Owen and his rebels lived and roamed midway between Kansas and Oklahoma. If she took Owen out, it was believed his small rebel forces would most likely turn on themselves—sheer chaos—and then go after the other rebel camps until they all but collapsed in the heat of battle. However, many had tried and, like the Last Pharmacist, Owen was elusive and well protected. He was the wall between Kansas and Oklahoma and further unity. The lack of air support and additional police and army forces kept each state its own entity. He was also one of the walls between her and the Last Pharmacist. A wall that she would tear down brick by brick and body by body; nothing was going to stop her.

  Out of habit, she pulled her scarf down on her forehead and adjusted her goggles, then climbed out of the moat that surrounded the South Kansas entrance. She had been here once as a child, when her parents and an entire platoon drove the fifty miles at top speed from Oklahoma. An entire platoon; that was something she wished she had now. Something the Kansas or Oklahoma Gendarmerie force was not willing to give her. She chuckled. Uncle Baul tried, but was laughed out of his commander’s office. Although other Gendarmerie forces would accommodate her, the moment she left Kansas, she was no longer a police officer; she was merely a citizen or, worse, a bounty hunter. A bounty hunter accepted by the government and the Gendarmerie, but still entirely on her own while outside.

  Her jacket flapped violently against her taut stomach, but she pulled herself out of the moat and moved farther into the darkness. When she had come out the door, she immediately went to the right, away from the floodlights, and lay in the darkness waiting for anything to attack. She had lain there for over thirty minutes before she moved deeper into darkness and across the moat constructed to capture water and to help keep out unauthorized entry. The moat was drained two days before her scheduled departure to keep Owen and his rebels from becoming suspicious, which was close to the normal monthly schedule but if they were paying attention they would know it was a couple of days too soon. She didn’t want to wait.

  The cameras didn’t follow her for fear if someone was watching they would notice the movement and come after her. She had another ten minutes before the cameras activated and immediately sensed her movement.

  She crawled several feet from the moat—expecting something, but hearing nothing—and slowly stood into a crouch position. Finally, she drew in a breath and stood, and was nearly knocked down by the wind. Uncle Baul was right, she thought. The wind season was lasting longer than usual, which meant more violent storms and gusts that were above seventy miles an hour when calm.

  “Damn,” She uttered, barely able to breathe, and immediately pulled up her mask. It matched her scarf in color but was a modified surgical mask guaranteed to stop the smallest of particle and filter in clean, breathable air. She had two in her pack for fear of losing the one she wore. Another one of Tank’s creations. She’d have to personally thank him when she got back. Maybe even add a house to her villa. He certainly took care of her.

  Then the freight train came barreling toward her, and just as she turned to race back to the moat the tornado twisted left and went due north.

  She stopped, caught her breath, and just as she started south across the barren stretch, a pistol touched her temple.

  “Can’t trust those got-damned tornadoes. They’s swivel ever which way,” A voice followed the gun from the darkness. “You don’t look like much but Owen will be proud I found him a scavenger who was able to escape the military dictatorship we’re forced to live with.”

  Jasmine started to turn.

  “Nope. You don’t wanna to do that. Owen likes’ em alive before he cooks’ em.” He looked her up and down. “I don’t know what’s under that piece of shit pants but I’m sure he’ll wanna fuck you. Might even keep you fer breed’n if yer hips are strong.” He shoved the pistol against her temple, pushing her head back. “Let’s get walking a’fore that damned tornado da’cides to go south and carries us with it.”

  Chapter 7

  “Which way,” Jasmine asked just above a whisper. “I can’t see anything out here.”

  He didn’t answer. He just shoved her into the blinding darkness and walked as if able to see or feel where he wanted to go.

  Jasmine looked down and saw them; small faint glowing bulbs, like those used on an aircraft that lit the passage to an exit. Why she didn’t see them when she surveyed the area was a slap in the face. She was better than thi
s and, although a faint amber, she should have noticed them. She should have seen him or at least heard him when he approached her. Especially a vehicle of sort would have made enough noise over the wind for her to hear it. I had better get my act together, she thought, or I’ll never make it to Dallas…

  She followed the lighted path to a Harley Davidson motorcycle. The bike of her dreams of all things, a Harley Davidson Softtail. She took it as a good sign. That would get her to Oklahoma, and if she were lucky through the city, maybe even to the Red River or at least as far as she had gas.

  “You know, I’m such a good guy, I’m gonna let you sit up front,” the stranger said. His words were in the midst of a laugh. “Yer’n gonna ease yerself on that bike and put yer arms behind your back,” he continued in an odd southern accent. Not quite the Texas drawl, nor the southeast hillbillies she’d heard about, but a mixture of both along with the lack of an education. He was also dressed in old military clothing with multiple coats and wore an old soft helmet. The tips of his gloves were gone, exposing brown nails and chapped fingertips.

  “I’ll need to take my pack off first,” Jasmine said in a manner and tone that depicted fear.

  He stared at her for a long beat, sizing her up, looking at her hands for a weapon he might have missed when he crept up on her, but at the time, all he saw were the weird look’n binoculars that still hung from a strap from around her neck. That and the backpack that looked full with harmless crap. She’s probably carrying food, water and surely something stolen. Accord’n to Owen, gypsies were known to be thieves, scavengers, and vagabonds. You certainly have to guard your belongin’s when they’s around, that’s fer sure, he thought. Owen said when he was a boy a gypsy woman from Dallas robbed his parents of hundreds of dollars which was why they had to stay outside. They didn’t have the money to pay for a place of any size and the government pigs refused to let them in.

  “I don’t trust you gypsies, you hear? So move nice and slow,” the stranger said, leveling his pistol and pointing it at her chest. “I’d be heartbroken if’n I had to kill ya... I never had a gypsy a’fore... Hell, I don’t know if I want one. Owen says gypsies work for the devil himself, and they’s be da’cause of the meteor.”

  Jasmine wanted to laugh. Aunt Dooriya was right. She loosened the breast strap and the pack eased back a little. She then slowly thumbed both straps and moved her hands up as if removing the pack and before the stranger could blink, she pulled her shotgun and planted the barrel on his forehead. Startled, he jumped, and was surprised he didn’t think to pull the trigger.

  “Your silly little twenty-two will hurt, but mine will take what little brains you have left in that thick head of yours and spread them all around the barrens. There won’t even be enough left of that thick skull of yours to hang on a post,” Jasmine said, smiling a smile that sent a shiver down his back.

  Sumbitchen gypsies, cain’t trust’em, the stranger thought. He then, as if after a flash of though, laughed and said, “You ain’t so smart, you didn’t chain’ba a round.”

  “Don’t have too, it’s an automatic, oh, and look, the safety isn’t on either,” Jasmine answered, smiling.

  The smile sent another shiver down his back as he leaned in and took a closer look. He whistled and said, “Sumbitch if’n you didn’t get the drop on me…” Sumbitchen, gypsies.

  Jasmine reached over, plucked the pistol from his hand, and tucked it in her belt, and as his eyes followed her hand he nearly stepped back in surprise, she was carrying two pistols on her hip. “Sumfuckingbitch,” he shouted and then thought, sumbitchen, gypsies.

  “What’ your name?” Jasmine asked, smiling, almost giggling.

  “Toby,” The stranger answered.

  “You know, Toby, I’m such a good gal, I’m gonna let you sit up front,” Jasmine said. Her words were in the midst of the same mocking laugh. “You’re’n gonna ease yerself on that bike and put yer arms behind your back,” she continued in the same thick accent. “And I’m gonna do you one better. I’m going to stick this here gun in your belt, and it’s going to be pointing at your balls. You make one move and ka-pow, got it?”

  Toby gulped. Sumbitchen, gypsies

  In the distance, she could hear the faint roar of another freight train following the previous one. In less than five minutes, the tornado passed maybe twenty yards from where they stood. The roar was horrible and the debris was worse. She saw every imaginable thing she could think of in the funnel, from animals to decayed human bodies.

  While Toby swung a leg over the Harley, Jasmine looked around, expecting a partner or two to rush out of the darkness to come to his aid; yet, she saw nothing and heard nothing but the roar. She returned the shotgun to its place in her pack, tightened her the straps, and eased up behind him and cuffed him with his zip lock ties.

  “Head on the gas tank, Toby,” She said, gently pushing his head down. “Head on the gas tank or I leave your worthless body here for the next tornado to drag all the way to Canada.”

  Toby laid his forehead on the gas tank, mumbling, “And what’cha think ya gonna do, use me as bait to get across the barrens?”

  She tucked his pistol between his belt and stomach with the barrel pointed at his crotch. She practiced grabbing the handle and whispering, “pow,” and he flinched each time. The act sent a pain to his groin. He winced.

  “Oh, no-no. I want to meet Owen. I want to rape him, brutalize him, kill him, then cook and eat him. And if you’re nice, I might share some of it with you. But for sure my belly and pack will be full,” Jasmine said in a manner, tone, and accent that she remembered her grandmother used when confronted by someone. Her grandmother’s presence usually made the shyer ones slink back and those that were brave gave it a second thought but in the end usually backed off. “I’m also low on money. I can’t spend credits outside the city.”

  “Gypsies don’t eat people. You’d steal dem blind, but you ain’t got it in you,” Toby said with a slight stutter followed by a faint slurp.

  “Oh, yes we do. We have for hundreds of years. Sometimes we just drank their blood but mostly we feasted. I for one love the taste of a man’s heart.”

  “Sumbitch,” Toby uttered. “Goddamn sumbitch.” He shook as if cold. “You ain’t gonna make it.” He chuckled. “He’s got too many men from here to the OK entrance.”

  “Maybe. Maybe not,” Jasmine answered. “But I’m betting I will, and you’re going to take me straight to him.”

  Toby slurped drool. Something he apparently did when he was scared.

  She then reeled in the string of lights, unhooked it from its battery, and put them into one of the saddlebags.

  She kick started the Harley and smiled. It was her first real smile since her father died.

  She leaned forward. “Better tighten those thighs, Toby. I don’t want to lose you or let that pistol go off on its own,” Jasmine said in a voice that was turning into a coolness that even she had never heard. “And understand, Toby. If you try something and I can’t get to that pistol, my cannon will blow a hole completely through you. If, that is, it doesn’t explode when it hits you…” She hesitated for a beat for the dramatics… “Believe me when I say this, Toby. I’ll have the cannon out and fired before I hit the ground.”

  “Sumbitch,” Toby mumbled as she slowly drove off into the darkness. “Owen will have my heart for lunch tomarra, yes he will…” Then he thought, isn’t that what she said. Oh, sumbitch, she can read minds...

  She leaned against him and whispered into his ear, “Mmmm. Maybe he’ll share your heart with me...”

  Sumfuckingbitch...

  Behind her was the only sanctuary that she had. Behind her was the only family she had. With her, she had a deranged man who would take her to Owen. Certainly, he was no bargaining chip, but superstitious enough to resurrect Owen’s fears from his childhood. Might even be a shield for a couple of minutes. Either way, he was worth bringing with her.

  Owen’s id, and a picture of Owen’s dead body, wo
uld bring her two hundred and fifty thousand US credits. Credits accepted in all the underground cities throughout the US and would later be accepted in the newly developed US in all states. Money that very few people had.

  Alive, Owen was worth zero.

  Within five minutes, a new tornado, like a mortician carrying away a body, dropped down and carried away all traces of Jasmine’s tracks as if she had never stood in the grip of Death atop the Nine of Swords.

  Chapter 8

  Through her night-scope binoculars and from a mile out, Jasmine saw the faint glow of campfires. A half a mile out, and with calm winds, she could see the silhouette of shanties, lean-to’s, a few buildings and what looked to be burned out cars and trucks. A quarter of a mile out she stopped the Harley, dropped the kickstand, and then dropped Toby. He fell with a hard thud and exhaled when the impact knocked the wind out of him.

  She knelt down. “Make a sound Toby and the second sound you hear will be a bullet,” Jasmine whispered. Toby nodded, then slurped, but said nothing. “How many people are here?” Toby didn’t answer. “Toby, I’m really trying to be nice here. How many?”

  “Fif-fifteen men—” He slurped. “Fi-five women. No kids.” He slurped.

  “You really need to take care of that slurping problem, Toby. That can’t be healthy.”

  “Yes’m,” Toby answered, then slurped. “As— As soon as I can.”

  Jasmine removed her binoculars from her backpack and looked at the small, whatever it was—town, village, camp; it was hard to say—looking for guards. She couldn’t see anyone. Although there were small campfires, she didn’t see any people.