Jack stood up and shined his flashlight around the area. “That’s different.”
Karen was seated up against the far wall with Alissa in her lap. She stood up, hoisted the little girl onto her hip and the pair moved to Jack’s side.
“What is that?”
Jack shook his head. “I don’t know but it’s getting louder.”
They didn’t have to wait long for an answer. On the far side of the parking level a large crack briefly formed on the cement wall. A second later a torrent of water burst its way through it and made quick work of flooding the level. As the water rushed in it moved debris and cars along with it.
Jack leaped into action, knowing their time was limited.
“We’ve gotta move!”
He scooped up a bag of supplies with one arm and grabbed Alissa from Karen with the other. He started scrambling up a pile of broken cement desperate to reach higher ground.
Karen didn’t move. Or perhaps couldn’t. Caught like a deer in the headlights she was frozen in place, watching the water as it took over the parking level.
Alissa screamed out, “Mommy!”
Jack whipped around and saw Karen in suspended animation, a wall of fast moving water churned its way straight toward her.
“Karen! Let’s go!”
Their shouts snapped her out of her daze. Quickly she grabbed a bag of supplies and scrambled after Jack and Alissa but she was too slow. As the ocean water swirled up around her she lost her balance and was swept up in its torrent.
Jack reached out and grabbed Karen by her upper arm, roughly lifting her out of the murky water to safety just as another wave of ocean and cement crashed below them. He threw her over his shoulder and climbed to the plateau where he had left Alissa.
From their new vantage point they watched on as the ocean wreaked havoc around them. There had been only a few cars parked on this lowest level. The initial impact and the earthquakes that followed had crumpled most of them up into mangled balls of steel and plastic. Now the flood waters were taking their turn with them. Cars were being picked up and crashed into one another, others crashed into the cement support pillars, further damaging them. The water also churned up bodies. Where they came from Jack couldn’t be sure.
Karen put her hand on Jack’s shoulder.
“Hey Jack?”
He turned toward her with his flashlight, checking to make sure everything was alright.
“You ok?”
“Yeah, I just wanted to thank you for pulling me out of the water. Not the first time you’ve saved my life in the past few days.”
He was standing in the middle of the apocalypse, dead bodies, water and mangled vehicles as far as the eye could see and yet he still managed to blush.
“No problem.”
SEVEN
Day 4.
The frequency of earthquakes had gone down considerably a few days after impact. Everett spent a lot of his time watching the surveillance camera.
“Well, the sky is still gray but it looks like the water is startin’ to recede a bit. I can see the top of the stop sign on the corner.”
“Uh huh.”
Everett looked toward the kitchen table. Skyler had been in that same position the last time he checked on her. Sitting at the table, slowly turning the tuning dial on the radio, listening — and hoping — for a signal.
He turned toward her in his seat.
“Think it may be a little too early for that, angel.”
“Yeah, I know but I need to know if Bryce is — AHHHHHHHHH!”
Skyler screamed out in pain, raising both hands to her head. Everett was by her side in a flash.
“Another one angel?”
Skyler managed a nod.
“Yes. So much worse than a migraine. Why won’t it stop?”
Since the asteroid’s impact Skyler had been terrorized by intermittent and painful headaches.
“Can I get you something?” Everett asked. But he already knew the answer. He felt helpless when these headaches came on. There was nothing he could do to help his granddaughter, and he wasn’t used to that.
“I don’t think aspirin is going to help, Grampa.”
“Ok then. Here. Sit down over here and relax.”
Everett helped her out of her seat and guided her over to one of the davenport’s matching oversized chairs. Skyler was in too much pain to relax. Or breathe.
Her grandfather was still determined to provide her comfort in some way. “Darlin’, let me get you something to eat.”
“I’m not really —,” she started. But she knew he wanted to do something, anything, to help her. “Ok, sure, thanks Grampa. I think it’s starting to go away. Jesus.”
Skyler rubbed temples, trying to clear her head. Everett kneeled down beside her with a flat tin of MRE raviolis and a plastic fork.
“Here try this. Maybe it’s a sugar thing? You really haven’t been eating much.”
Skyler took the tin and the fork from him.
“I don’t know what’s causing them but God damn, they aren’t fun.”
She lifted a fork full of the ravioli to her mouth. She managed to chew and swallow but she cringed at the taste of it. She studied the can looking for an expiration date.
“Somethin’ wrong, darlin’?”
“I don’t know, what’s the date on this stuff? Tastes a little funny to me. A lotta funny, actually.”
“That’s the same batch we had yesterday ... should be fine for another 5 years at least.”
Skyler ate another ravioli and shook her head. She just could not get over the spoiled taste of it. She looked toward Buddy who was laying down on the floor, hoping she’d drop something.
“Want some ravioli, boy?”
She held the tin low to the ground and watched as Buddy devoured what was left of the MRE. He had no issues at all with the way it tasted.
Everett watched on with a look of concern on his face.
In the bowels of the parking structure, Jack had a similar look of concern as he watched Alissa and Karen. Alissa was curled up in her mother’s lap, sobbing. Karen rocked her daughter back and forth while stroking her hair and whispering.
“Shhhhh, baby. It’ll be okay. Shhhhhh.”
“But mommy, my head hurts so bad.”
“I know ‘Lissa, it’ll go away soon, I promise.”
Karen looked up at Jack and gave him a weak smile.
“At least we aren’t getting them at the same time.”
Day 8.
The good news was that the earthquakes had stopped entirely. The bad news was Skyler was still getting headaches. Once again she was seated with her head in her hands, praying for the pain to stop. And once again Everett was by her side, wishing he could do something to help.
“It’ll be over soon, darlin’, hang in there.”
She nodded. “It’s going away. I think they’re getting shorter.”
“Good. Can I get you somethin’? Somethin’ to eat maybe?”
Skyler smiled at her grandfather. He just wouldn’t give up.
“Just a coffee, please.”
“Angel, you haven’t eaten anything today.”
“I know. I guess I’m just not that hungry, Grampa. Maybe it’s just the stress of all this. Or these headaches.”
Everett got up off of the couch and crossed into the kitchen. He began to pour them both some coffee from the old style percolator that was sitting on the stove top. The coffee maker hadn’t survived the first earthquake. Skyler thanked the coffee gods for the percolator.
“You still have to eat. You’re going to need your strength. Austin is a good seventeen hundred miles away, and we may wind up walkin’ for most of it.”
“You think Bryce is ok?” She’d walk a million miles if it meant the three of them would be together again.
She got up and headed to the kitchen table, once again turning on the old radio. In what had become almost an hourly ritual she turned the tuning dial slowly, hoping to hear a signal through th
e static.
Everett brought over two piping hot cups of coffee and a granola bar to the table. He winked at Skyler as he sat down.
“Oh, I guarantee it, darlin’. Besides, your brother learned from the best.”
She couldn’t help but smile back. “As did I.”
He slid the granola bar across the table toward Skyler.
“Eat this.”
Skyler started to push it back toward her grandfather.
“For me, darlin’. Please.”
Skyler rolled her eyes. He gave so much and asked for so little. But still, emotional manipulation was not something she cared to cave to. The Chu kids learned that the hard way.
“Ugh. Ok.”
She unwrapped the granola bar and took a small bite. It tasted terrible to her and she was barely able to mask her disgust as she chewed and swallowed it.
Everett could see there was a problem but chose not to say anything. Satisfied that she would eat the entire bar, he got up from the table with his coffee and headed toward the desk.
While his back was turned Skyler fed the rest of the granola bar to an eager Buddy who had once again been waiting patiently under the table for scraps. She mouthed “Good boy” to him when he finished it.
Everett sat down in front of the computer and after a few clicks he was once again viewing the world through his one remaining surveillance camera.
“Water level is down and it looks like the sun is finally trying to come out. Can you believe we haven’t seen it in over a week? Didn’t know if we’d ever — well would you look at that!”
As Skyler got up from the kitchen table the granola wrapper fell from the table to the floor, unnoticed. Once at the desk she looked over her grandfather’s shoulder at the monitor.
“What is it?”
Everett pointed to the bottom left hand corner of the frame. “Take a look.”
A man wearing a life preserver in a canoe was paddling down the street.
Everett chuckled.
“Looks like some folks managed to get through this just like we did.”
Skyler was skeptical. “He probably should have waited. Not sure where he thinks he’s paddling to.”
The loud crinkling sound of the granola wrapper caught their attention. They both turned toward the sound just in time to see Buddy licking every last crumb off the wrapper.
Everett looked up at Skyler and shook his head.
“I wonder where he got that.”
Skyler feigned innocence and halfheartedly chided her four legged partner in crime.
“Buddy, where did you get that? Such a bad boy. Very bad.”
Everett shook his head and turned back toward the monitor. After days of nothing but storms and gray skies, the sun had finally made an appearance from behind the clouds.
“What a beautiful sight. Gives me hope that we’ll get out there and I’ll get to see some color return to that pretty face of yours.”
“Yeah, I know, I know. I look terrible — but if I may change the subject, what happened to that canoe guy?”
Everett studied the monitor more closely. The canoe could still be seen in the lower right hand corner of the screen.
“Hmm, let me zoom in a bit.”
With a few keystrokes he was zooming in on the canoe. On the screen they could see it was hung up on the stop sign down the street, but the man who had been paddling it was nowhere to be found. A small pile of clothes and a life preserver were all that could be seen on the canoe’s seat.
Everett continued to zoom and pan the camera, looking for the man.
“Did you see him fall in? Water can’t be more than 5 feet deep now.”
“I didn’t see anything. Buddy distracted me.”
Skyler looked at the dog laying under the table. He wagged his tail and continued to lick the granola wrapper.
“So bad, Buddy. So incredibly bad.”
On the monitor the canoe broke free from the stop sign and drifted away with the current and off the screen.
EIGHT
Day 14.
They worked by lantern light. The room was dim but there was more than enough light for Skyler and Everett to pack their rucksacks with supplies from the storage room. And more than enough light for him to see that Skyler’s skin had gone way past pale and was now nearly white.
“How are you doing over there, angel?”
“I’m doing ok, Grampa. Happy to be leaving the bunker and happy to be starting our trip to Austin.”
“Good. Now pack enough provisions for 3 or 4 days. We should be able to find more along the way.”
Skyler nodded. “What about weapons?”
“We’re going to have to leave the heavy artillery behind. If you can wear it comfortably take it. Just make sure you have more than enough ammo with you too.”
Skyler made her way into the weapons room where she grabbed a leather knife sheath and its matching combat knife, which she strapped to her inner thigh. She crossed the room to the Lucite display case that housed her old Ruger. She smiled as lifted it out of the case.
“Together again old friend.”
She loaded the Ruger and grabbed what was probably too many boxes of extra rounds and put them in her rucksack. She didn’t need room for food anyway. She hadn’t eaten, nor had she wanted to eat, in days.
Finally she searched for and found an Urban Carry Holster. She expertly put it in place at the small of her back and slid her Ruger into it. She stood up to leave the room.
“Grampa!,” she yelled. “Do you have a weapon?”
“No, can you grab me a pistol and some ammo? I’m almost done here.”
“Any preferences?” she called out.
“Dealer’s choice.”
She cocked her head and turned her attention back to the Lucite case. After a quick once over of the merchandise she picked up the AF2011A1 Dueller Prismatic, its ammo and another holster for her grandfather.
Skyler headed back to the supply room and handed the pistol and its accouterments over to Everett.
“I forgot about this one. Nice pick, Darlin’. Here, you take this.” He handed her a rather impressive looking two-way radio.
“Walkie talkie?”
“I prefer the term ‘combat radio.’ Water proof, long range and fully supported by the Department of Defense. I hope we don’t get separated out there, but if we do, these things will keep us in touch.”
“Separated? Ha, good luck trying to get rid of me.” Skyler took a closer look at the radio. “Are they on the same channel?”
“They are,” he answered. “Keep it on 897 for now.”
“897? Any significance to that?”
“Absolutely none. I think it’s better that way. Also, I want you to take this.” Skyler offered her open palm and Everett placed a watch on top of it.
Skyler took it from him and inspected it. The strap was made of some sort of fabric in army green. The silver casing around its plain black face with white numbers was chipped and scratched, and although it was clearly very old it was ticking.
“Where did you get this?” She asked, turning it over and inspected the back. A list of serial numbers she didn’t understand were engraved on the back, along with the watch’s manufacturer, Elgin.
“That’s an old military watch. It’s not very fancy but it doesn’t need batteries and can take a beating. Just make sure you give it a wind every now and then.”
“I never even stopped to think about something so basic as telling time. I wonder what else I’m forgetting.”
“Speaking of forgetting, can you think of anything else we may be needin’ before we head on out of here?”
Skyler took a moment to think as she affixed the watch to her left wrist. “Actually I can.” She headed for the indoor garden area. Once inside she grabbed two fistfuls of seed packets off the shelf. As she came out of the room, she held them up for Everett to see. “I’m sure we’ll find a use for these along the way.”
Everett gave his granddaughter
a nod, “I’m sure we will.”
Within the hour Skyler and Everett stood with their backs to the door of the bunker and surveyed all they were about to leave behind. The bunker was a mess but it had fulfilled its purpose. They had survived. Their next step was to begin a new life, one that would start as soon as they left the bunker behind.
Everett studied Skyler’s face. Her pallor was of real concern to him.
“You’re sure you’re ok to do this now?”
She saw the worry on his face. Skyler had tried not to spend too much time in front of the bunker’s bathroom mirror. She couldn’t deny that her skin tone had taken a turn for the worst. She was beyond pale, no doubt. But she felt absolutely fine.
“Yeah. Haven’t had a headache for a few days. I think that nightmare is over.”
Everett nodded. “How ‘bout food? How long haven’t you had that?”
She hated to lie to her grandfather but no amount of “I feel fine, really.” was working. “I had something ... before.”
“Ok Darlin’. I just — “
Skyler didn’t want to talk about it again. EVER. She nodded back toward the storage room and changed the subject.
“Are we comin’ back for the rest?”
Everett shook his head. “The water may have receded up there but we could have a hundred thousand gallons or more sittin’ on the other side of that vault door. Once we open that this place is history.”
He made his way through the bunker’s steel doorway and headed up the steps toward the vault door. Skyler and Buddy followed.
“Grampa, how are we getting out of here then?
“I’ve got a plan.”
After two weeks the water had also receded around Karen, Jack and Alissa. As they sat trapped on their small piece of concrete spiked with rebar the water slowly seeped its way through the cracks and crevices of their crumbling surroundings.
Receding water and the fact that they were all somehow still alive was the good news.
The bad news was everything else. Other than the cement island that had become their temporary home, the bottom floor of the parking garage was in shambles. Broken concrete, rebar, smashed cars, and indistinguishable debris of all kinds blocked their way in every direction. It was not going to be easy for the three of them to climb their way up and out to the surface.
Plagued (Book 1): The Girl Who Chased The Shadows Page 5