by Bryan James
“What do you think?” I asked Romeo, absently.
Silence.
“You willing to hump it off the bed? You were pretty enamored with that stuffed animal you found the other day…” I trailed off as I looked down. His ears were flat against his head and his eyes were narrowed. He was making a slow, deep growl in his chest, and his hackles were raised.
I’d only seen him do that when we were in the thick of it with the zeds. But a quick look around confirmed that we were alone. Just thunder in the distance.
But no lightning.
That was odd.
He was staring south, back toward Seattle.
No lightning. No clouds.
They say that animals can detect natural disasters long before humans. They say that they’re especially attuned to disruptions in the natural order. They say this, even about animals—like Romeo—who routinely eat sharp objects and scrape their rears on the carpet.
But in this case, they were right.
***
A dull orange glow simmered beneath a cloud of ash and smoke. Above the massive cone, whose silhouette could be seen in a haze-shrouded pall beneath the conflagration, the fires of the earth burned bright. Streaks of angry red and smoldering yellow ran down the mound like tears, and the sky roiled above.
This was not good.
“Mike, are you seeing …” Kate’s voice was falsely calm, intended for Ky’s ears, but I heard the anxiety as they emerged from the wreckage of the house, hand in hand.
“I don’t think there’s anyone who’s not seeing this,” I said softly, putting a hand on Romeo’s back in an effort to calm him. “Living or dead.”
“Make sure she’s okay, and then take a look at our packs and weapons. We may have to move soon,” I turned to the truck, grimacing as the rocks on the driveway ground into my bare feet. “And toss me my boots?”
The boulder had landed behind the two spare tires, and for that we could be incredibly thankful. We had stocked two when we found the truck, knowing that they’d be needed at some point. Now, I just called that foresight dumb luck.
The boots landed in the dust next to Romeo and he jumped straight into the air, looking back over his shoulder as he landed, as if offended by the bad joke. I couldn’t help laughing briefly as I pulled the kevlar boots over my ankles and moved to the front of the truck.
There was no other way that would work. We couldn’t move the truck back with flat tires, and we couldn’t change the flats with the boulder in the bed.
It would have to happen the old-fashioned way.
I gripped the truck underneath the fiberglass bumper, finding a handhold on the steel frame behind the winch. Sitting back so that the weight was on my legs, not my back—always lift with your legs, kids—I started to lift.
Have you ever tried to push a wall? Really, just stood there with your hands against a cement block load-bearing wall, trying to make it topple, looking like a constipated, handle-bar-mustachioed-from-an-old-timey-carnival asshole? Give it a shot. That’s what the first five seconds felt like. Nothing moved, other than the blood shooting through my veins. My heart throbbed and my hands burned.
I just pushed harder, knowing this was the only option.
As the thunderous mountain in the far distance lit the sky, I made slow, painful headway in this battle against the machine. Metal groaned as the weight shifted slowly. Momentum helped as I gained an inch, then another, then two more. The last window in the truck shattered as the metal frame bent slightly under the two competing pressures, while the large rock in the bed moved an inch. Suddenly, the entire boulder was rolling back, the gentle thirty-degree incline that I had managed being sufficient to enroll gravity on the side of your humble hero.
The massive rock tumbled into the dust, teetered on one edge, then began an inexorable roll toward what remained of the tree line. I leaned forward quickly, lowering the machine to the ground and hoping to God that it would start.
Probably should have checked that first.
***
The truck started, and catastrophe was, for the moment, avoided.
The outline of what could only be Mount Rainier in the distance continue to highlight the southern sky as I made my way carefully into the remains of the cabin. The kitchen was a wasteland, dishes having leapt from the shelves to an early death on the hardwood floors. The books and lamps and other items from any normally flat surface littered the ground.
“I can’t believe it, but the safe room downstairs was mostly intact. The shelves were reinforced, and the crates were mostly tied down. I was able to salvage most of the MRE’s and canned stuff, and I found a few spare batteries and took all the water. It’s piled up next to the fireplace over there,” she jerked a thumb behind her as she spoke, pulling her hair back into a pony tail over her simple black t-shirt.
We had ditched our battle suits several days ago. They were made for war, and we were traveling—avoiding conflict whenever possible and trying to move light. We had lucked into a huge stash of tactical gear on our second day out (thanks again, capitalist gun-store owner), and had happily swapped our blood-soaked, sweat-stained battle rattle for some nylon bags and hearty cargo pants and t-shirts. The gentleman who had so carefully stashed the gear away for us had even left a cap in Ky’s size, which she used to great effect in her frequent napping. Kate pulled her hair tight and sighed.
“Go ahead and get dressed, and I’ll start loading. Tires okay?”
I nodded, but my voice was dubious. “She’ll drive, but not sure how far. I know that boulder had to have wracked the suspension, and I’m damn sure the alignment will be shot. But she started, and the tires are good to go, so we’ll go with it until we can’t.”
Kate smiled quickly, her voice teasing.
“You’re calling the truck a ‘she’ now?”
I thought carefully before answering.
“I figured anything as faithful and beautiful as that deserved the right title,” I said with a smile.
She groaned playfully and turned away dramatically toward the slightly cockeyed doorway to the driveway.
I guess I could have said it was because the headlights were crooked and there was a ton of junk in the trunk, but … one natural disaster per day suited me just fine.
Ky was laying on the dusty sofa, a blanket pulled to her chin as she stared out the window frame into the distance. The glass had shattered quickly during the beginning of the quake and the gentle breeze blew the night air through the living room.
I changed, pulling on the dark cargo pants, the tactical harness and my dark blue hoodie, checking the various pockets to make sure that all my gear was secure. I rooted through the medium sized duffle bag on the table that Kate and I shared, and pulled two fresh magazines from the internal pockets, stashing them in my harness and checking my rifle quickly before grabbing a bag of MRE’s and heading to the truck.
Kate was staring at the mountain—rather, the volcano—eyes distant.
“I didn’t realize that it was a volcano,” she said, and I nodded briefly.
“Most people don’t. All the mountains up here—Mt. Hood, Mt. Rainier, and of course Mt. Saint Helens—they’re all volcanos. This whole area sits next to a subduction zone near a fault line. Scientists have been predicting a cataclysmal earthquake in this area for years.” I grunted as I threw the bag into the bed of the truck, noticing the massive, boulder-sized indentation as I did so.
“I guess they just didn’t predict that it’d happen during a zombie apocalypse,” I joked.
She didn’t laugh.
Because it wasn’t that funny.
“How do you know all this shit?” she asked, leaning over and pulling a lace tight against her boot. “It’s like you’re a repository for useless knowledge that happens to come in handy at the most convenient time.”
I chuckled. Just like my movies.
“I watched a shit ton of Discovery channel when I was on location. Better than Real House Husbands of Malibu or W
haligator.”
“Whaligator?” she smiled briefly.
“It was on that science fiction channel,” I said, walking to the front of the truck and checking the new tires. I took on my movie star voice, “Half whale, half alligator, all monster!”
“Sounds incredible.”
“Yeah. Hence my knowledge of subduction zones.”
Kate’s eyes had become distant.
“Which way are we going?” she asked, walking to the edge of the house and looking out over the slowly receding water that was reflecting the moonlight in a murky pattern. The far-off, dull orange glow gave the eerie scene an added element of surrealism.
“We have to go down to the valley to move north,” I said, remembering the map. “There used to be a small river a mile north of us, running east-west, but if the land drops down to sea level there, it will all be under water now. I remember coming uphill from the south along the highway that we can see from here, so if the land continues to slope up or stays even, we might still have dry land further north. I say we make our way north, and then try to move east until we find a way across the river. We’re in the foothills of the mountains now, so if we stay to the east, we should be able to stay near higher, dry land.”
“Do we have the gas for that?” she asked quietly, still staring at the water. The orange glow was a little stronger, and I felt the thundering explosions of the mountain in the distance before I heard them.
“I don’t think so,” my voice faded off as I watched a large rock shoot from the top of what remained of Mount Rainier—previously an integral part of the Seattle skyline, and now a decapitated remnant of a different world.
“But we just have to keep moving. We can scrounge on the way.”
“And what do you think about them? Do you think this will help or hurt?”
“You mean do I think this just knocked three hundred million zombies on their collective rotten asses? No, I think it just deprived us of what remained of our precious civilization. We’re really in a new world, now. A world that we can’t hope to rebuild on the ashes of past success. We’re really on our own now.”
“How poetic.”
“Shut up.”
***
As the remains of the mountain to the south lit the sky with an orange display of nature’s anger, we prepared to leave.
We took our time loading the truck and checking our gear. The night was young, and we wanted to give the water that was going to recede time to do so. And truth be told, none of us truly felt safe as we prepared to head out into a world that had somehow gotten crueler than it was when it was only full of the undead.
Several hours later, Ky had mostly shaken herself out of the shock, and was asking questions about geology that we weren’t prepared to answer.
Romeo, in the meantime, filled his time by licking parts of his anatomy best left unsaid.
“I don’t know if it will happen again.”
“No, I don’t know what magnitude it was. It was big. Probably an 8 or 9.”
“How should I know if other mountains are erupting?”
“Do I think the San Francisco Bay Bridge is still standing? That’s an absurdly random question.” We were waiting for Kate to use the toilet for what could be the last time in a long while. There were definitely advantages to being a man.
“I’ve never seen it and was kinda hoping …” She let it trail off, as if feeling silly for harboring the slim hope. Sometimes I lost track of her age, and it really snuck up on me. Now I felt bad.
“I don’t know, but it’s a suspension bridge, so the supports aren’t as fragile and susceptible to earthquakes, so … maybe.” I was totally talking out of my ass. I knew as much about bridges as I did about women.
Kate emerged from the house and pulled the door behind her, trying to close it.
“Uh, no need,” I threw out the window, absently brushing a shard of glass from the empty frame and leaning over the steering wheel.
“Right, sorry.” She shook her head and climbed into the passenger’s seat. Behind her, Romeo stole a shot at her exposed ear and she cursed and laughed. “Old habits and all that. Ready.”
The truck moved awkwardly but capably. The suspension had been damaged, and the alignment was about six inches off—it felt like I was driving crookedly and I had to keep the wheel cocked slightly to the side—but the engine continued to purr. We passed the cabin longingly, knowing that its destruction was a mark of a more difficult road ahead.
The narrow pathway to the cabin was riddled with cracks and holes, but since it had never been asphalt, the dirt had shifted in such a way that there were no huge crevasses to avoid. For the most part, the gravel and rock had filled some of the smaller holes, and the larger gaps were still narrow enough for the truck’s oversized tires to bridge. Trees felled to either side made for a harrowing weave between large branches, but the thick forest seemed to have absorbed most of the fallen brush. One forlorn tree hung suspended by two of its comrades, branches entwined at the higher levels, keeping the uprooted stricken sentinel from toppling into the small road.
When we reached the two lane highway, I stopped at the crossroads, allowing the truck to idle momentarily as we took in the scene before us.
The flood waters had receded slightly here, but the road was destroyed, with slabs of asphalt and concrete jaggedly stretching toward the sky, muddy pits between long gaps of former roadway. Fifty feet from the intersection, a jagged ravine bisected the highway; on the other side of the narrow crack, the highway had shifted nearly twenty feet, so that the sides no longer aligned.
The earth was definitely moving toward the sea. The land was sinking beneath the bay, and the Pacific ocean beyond.
My God, that earthquake had been powerful.
Debris covered the muddy ground on both sides of the road, and odd items hung from the surviving trees. Dead fish, rocks, and seaborne debris were visible in equal parts as we began to gingerly make our way along the shattered roadway toward the north. The moonlight was an able compliment to our halogen lights, which had both miraculously survived the onslaught of rock and dirt at the cabin.
We picked our way carefully along the road, abandoning the actual pavement for the more consistent gravel shoulder and grassy easement alongside, dodging the odd car, fence, or marine debris as we moved slowly but consistently north.
The countryside was torn, but still recognizable. Despite the small berms of earth where the land had risen into new hills and valleys, the eastern side of the road had fared much better. While few houses were left standing, the darkness shrouded trees and even a few roadsigns that had survived. The deep water, and the press of billions of gallons of seawater, had subsided on the eastern side of the interstate before it reached this far, so the flood waters had mostly moved back to the western side of the highway.
Reaching a small rise in the roadway’s path overlooking the small valley below, we eventually came across the area that had been a river only hours ago.
I stopped the truck in a narrow stretch of roadway between two walls of trees, their shadows pushing out into the narrow passage. The soft rustle of woodland creatures was audible in the still night air, and a stiff breeze kicked up from the north, bringing with it the smell of colder days ahead.
Ahead, seawater had flooded the shallow valley, pushing boats and trees along the banks. In a testament to the strength of steel and iron, the bridge across what used to be the river still stood. But as a testament to the strength of nature, it was submerged above the roadway in seawater.
We weren’t going north across that bridge.
“I guess we need to find another way,” said Ky, leaning forward from the back seat and locking her eyes on the scene ahead. Kate was already staring at the map as I glared absently at the ruined escape route.
“I suppose so. It’s okay, we figured this would be a long shot. It’s too close to the sea. We need to move further to the …”
A hand had my shoulder and I stopped ta
lking, shocked for once by the quiet of the attack. A wizened head, eyes sunken and mouth agape, lunged through the open window at my side and thrust forward for my flesh. The moment’s hesitation passed quickly, and I reacted from instinct.
Curling my arm up as if lifting a drink to my lips, I caught the neck of the creature and wrapped my left hand around its skull, fingers slipping into the socket where the eye was planted deeply in the flesh. I pulled forward rapidly, turning my head from the stench of the thing even as I felt the characteristic and familiar pop. The energy left the face, and the body fell heavily against the door of the vehicle as the skull slipped from my fingers.
Before I could wipe my hand, Ky screamed and Romeo began to bark ferociously.
“Reverse would be good,” said Kate softly, struggling to bring her rifle to bear in the small space.
The headlights had suddenly illuminated more than fifty of the creatures, all sodden and shambling forward into the circle of light cast by the bright lamps of the large truck. I cursed, and threw the vehicle into reverse, hearing the tires squeal briefly before catching against the small strip of unmolested concrete.
“Where did they come from?” yelled Ky as the truck bounced hard against the uneven ground, my hands flying over the wheel to pull the vehicle around.
They stumbled forward, fading in and out of the bright lights as they moved toward us. I hit the gas and jerked the wheel to the left, pulling us around and accelerating away from the small herd. More than a hundred more had appeared, moving uphill and away from the watery destruction below, most of them flooding out of the trees that had been to either side of us.
No one answered Ky as I dodged debris and tree limbs backtracking to the roadway behind us.
“I saw a road cutting east back past the small shed with the realtor’s face on it,” Ky mentioned, staring out the side windows, carefully scanning for more creatures.
“Got it,” said Kate, aiming a flashlight at her bedraggled map. “It’s called Old Creek Road, and it heads due east for about five miles before we have a shot at turning north again.”