The sound cut out first, leaving a void in the grocery store office. A few seconds later, the video went out as well. A screen popped up apologizing for technical difficulties. With it, came the siren of the test screen filling the void once more. Alec covered his ears, as the sound was painfully high-pitched. Rifle flattened his own ears and let out a low howl that was in tune with the siren. Freeman turned off the TV without bothering to turn it down, and Rifle stopped. Both men stared at the blank screen for some time without saying a word.
* * *
“What do you think we should do?” Freeman turned to Alec.
“I don’t know,” Alec admitted. “Close the store for one thing. Send everybody home.”
“Are you sure it’s safe to leave?”
“No, but I can’t see it being any safer in here. The front of the store is all glass; people could easily break in.”
“There are security gates that cross over the glass.”
“Then maybe staying here would be fine, but there are going to be people who want to leave.”
“Are you one of them?”
“Yes.”
“Then go. I’ll handle things here.”
Alec turned and left the office without even saying goodbye. Rifle knew that something was wrong and stuck close by his side. Well, as close as he could without risking being hit by the wheels. Without saying a word to anyone, Alec left the grocery store. Freeman could deal with those inside and Alec was used to working almost completely alone. He had worked with a human partner in the past, in the military, but lately Rifle was his partner.
Once outside, Alec looked around cautiously. Everything was technically the same as it was before, but there was now a more ominous tone to it. Alec headed toward the sidewalk, having to skirt around curbs in the parking lot. He cursed his chair. He would much rather have been on foot, cutting through yards and taking whatever route he felt like. Instead, he had to stick to paved surfaces if he hoped to have any speed and not risk his chair getting stuck or caught up on something. Rifle kept his ears pricked up and his nose in the air, constantly scenting. Alec made sure to stay alert to his companion’s moods and movements. Going down the sidewalk was unnerving. Alec reacted to every shadow that moved, not knowing what might be a threat. He saw someone peering out at him from behind a curtain. It was tempting to go up to the nearest house and ask to be let in, but Alec needed to be in his own home. He knew his home, and it had many things to aid his current disability. He could protect himself there longer than anywhere else.
Footsteps pounded down the sidewalk behind him. Alec swung around, hating that he had nothing to defend himself with other than his fists, but he would do whatever he had to. It was only Michelle.
“Michelle? What are you doing out here?”
“There was an announcement over the speaker system in the store telling us about some attack or something.” Michelle was panting slightly from her run. “We were told to either leave, or stay in the store. I decided to leave. I saw you up the street and decided to catch up to you. Help you get home.”
“It’s not safe out here for you,” Alec told her.
“No safer than it is for you,” Michelle retorted.
“I know how to defend myself,” he said.
“Not in this you don’t.” Michelle kicked the wheel of Alec’s chair.
He scowled but didn’t say anything further. She was right. Without a proper weapon, there wasn’t much he could do. He wiggled his big toes but couldn’t get his ankle to move as he had earlier. Damn injury.
Michelle turned Alec around and began pushing him.
“I can move myself, you know.” Alec hated being pushed and she knew that. In fact, his wheelchair wasn’t even the kind that was easy to push. The handles were fairly low and small, forcing Michelle to hunch over.
“Suck it up, soldier.” Michelle told him that every time his physio was especially painful. “I’ll do the mobile stuff, you be the eyes and ears on the lookout for danger.” Apparently, she didn’t mind hunching.
“Fine. You remember where I live, right? Because we’re going there.”
“I remember. You don’t think the buses will come do you?” Michelle pointed out a bus stop.
“No.” Alec remembered the TV report. “They said they’re shutting down the public transit. If a bus does show up, I doubt it will stop.”
“So then we have to hoof it.”
“How much do you know about what’s happening?” Alec wondered.
“Not much.”
Alec told her what he had seen and heard on the TV. He felt Michelle’s hands tremble through the frame of his wheelchair. They didn’t speak after that.
* * *
Their walk was an eerie one. They didn’t see too many people, but those they did see were frightening. One man threw himself in through the big bay window at the front of a house, shattering it. Screams from inside the house greeted the man. He must have been one of the rampaging attackers. Another man was standing on his roof preaching about the end of days. Through his open front door, Alec saw streaks of blood. Here and there were broken doors and shattered windows. Sometimes people moved within those houses, sometimes they were stone quiet. One house had gunfire going on inside it; a 9mm handgun, from the sound of it, being fired erratically. Probably an inexperienced shooter. A woman was clawing her way down the street. Her legs were a bloody, pulpy mass, most likely run over by a car. They reminded Alec of his own injury, and he unconsciously rubbed his thighs.
Michelle took a step toward this last woman, as if to help her. But Rifle stepped between them and growled a warning, the hair on his shoulders raised in a bristly mane.
“Listen to the dog,” Alec whispered, “we should keep moving.”
“She’ll die,” Michelle whispered back, but resumed pushing Alec along. “Maybe I should call 911?”
“Listen to the dog,” was all Alec would reply. He knew dogs had better senses and greater instincts than his own. Rifle was the best asset they had right now, and he was going to use him. He trusted his companion completely. They moved on, and Michelle did call 911 on Alec’s cell phone, but the call never got through.
Alec was surprised at how few cars were on the road. He expected a lot more people to be racing home or over to their loved one’s homes. Only a small handful of cars went past. One was driving so erratically that it was bouncing between the cars parked on the street and was constantly at risk of slamming nose first into a street lamp. Alec didn’t have a long enough look to tell for sure, but he thought he saw a little kid behind the wheel.
Thankfully, Alec’s house wasn’t too far from the market. They had been lucky so far, but he understood that luck was only a temporary asset. He breathed a sigh of relief when he saw the white panel, two-story home he shared with his brother. He hoped Nathan was okay.
“What is that?” Michelle had a higher vantage point than Alec had and could see the top of his driveway over the bushes that separated it from his neighbour’s yard.
“I can’t see, move me closer,” Alec commanded.
“I think it’s a man.” Michelle pushed him to the bottom of the driveway.
It was definitely a man; a young man, almost naked, and badly wounded. His arm was pinned under the garage door. He was thrashing about and squawking like a wounded animal. Michelle left Alec and went towards him. Rifle starting barking and growling but Michelle ignored him.
“Michelle!” Alec started up the driveway after her, but having legs meant she was faster. “Michelle, no!”
Michelle bent down to try to help the man. He grabbed her arm, almost as if relieved that she was there. Almost. Michelle pulled away with a shriek.
Alec reached her. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine.” Michelle held out her arm. There was a tiny amount of blood, but clearly, it was nothing deep, just a small flesh wound. “He tried to bite me.”
“You’ll be okay. I told you not to.” Alec looked at the young man. He reach
ed for them, trying to grab them with his free hand. His feet kicked pathetically against the asphalt.
“Is someone out there?” a small voice called out from inside the garage.
“Yeah, who’s in there?” Alec called back through the aluminium door.
“My name is Danny,” the voice replied, “my friend is hurt.”
“Okay, we’re coming in.”
“No!” Danny yelled. “Don’t let him in!”
“I’m not opening the garage door, don’t worry.” Alec knew instantly that Danny was talking about the man who was pinned. “I live here. I’m going to come through the house.”
“Okay,” Danny said. “Hurry.”
“Come on.” Alec led Michelle up a ramp to the front door. He pulled out his key and unlocked it. “There’s a first aid kit in the bathroom upstairs. If someone’s hurt, we may need it. Go get it.”
Michelle ran off upstairs, taking two at a time. Rifle went off to do a patrol of the house, moving quickly with his head lowered. The boy pinned under the garage had put him on edge. Alec wheeled over to a locked storage cabinet and opened it. Inside was a duffel bag filled with all his military gear. Knowing exactly where everything was located in it, he opened a pocket and took out a .45 pistol. He quickly jammed in a loaded magazine and stuck two extras into the pockets on either side of his cargo pants. He then closed up the duffel bag and slung it over his shoulders, kind of like a backpack. Michelle came down the stairs.
“Got it.” She held up the red box with the white cross.
“Come on.” Alec put the pistol in his lap and headed for the door that led into the garage.
Since the garage door was broken and needed to be propped up by a wooden block, there was a simple bolt lock on the door that led into the house. Despite working as mechanics, neither Alec nor his brother had gotten around to fixing the damn thing. Alec slid the bolt back and rolled across the threshold. He glided down the ramp on the other side to the garage floor.
“Please help.” A boy, presumably Danny, ran over to him. He looked surprised to see a man in a wheelchair. He probably hadn’t figured his potential saviour would be handicapped.
“What happened?” Michelle went straight to the girl in the corner. Her leg was bleeding pretty badly.
“We were trying to find our friend’s house, but then we ran into that guy so we hid in a car,” Danny blathered. “Then some other car hit him so we decided to hide out in here. But the guy got back up and he attacked Emma.”
“Emma is the wounded girl?” Alec clarified.
“Yeah. We live in a foster home together. Please help her.”
“Hi, Emma.” Michelle stroked the girl’s hair back. She was pale. “My name is Michelle. I’m going to take care of you.”
“Hi,” Emma replied weakly. She looked like she was going to be sick.
Rifle came in and walked over to Emma. He sniffed at her wounded leg and whined. Emma smiled weakly and started petting him. Rifle let her. Michelle inspected Emma’s leg, and then went over to Alec.
“I don’t know if just a first aid kit will cut it,” she told Alec in a low voice. “She needs a real doctor.”
“There’s an ER doc who lives just a few blocks from here. Nathan worked on her car once,” Alec remembered. “If she’s home, I could convince her to come over.”
“And if she’s not?”
“Maybe she’ll have better supplies or drugs in her house,” Alec shrugged.
Michelle nodded and went back over to Emma.
“I’m coming with you.” Danny stood at Alec’s side. He had listened to their conversation.
“It’s too dangerous.” Alec shook his head.
“Not if you have that gun.” Danny had noticed the pistol in his lap.
Alec looked the kid up and down. He was lanky and his dirty brown hair was a mess and needed a trim. He was also pale in a way that suggested he didn’t get out in the sun very much.
“How fast can you run?” Alec asked him.
“Faster than you.” He was apparently also a smart ass.
“Fine.” Alec didn’t think the young girl had time for them to argue. She was bleeding quite a bit. “But you listen to every word I say.”
“Yes, Sir,” Danny snapped a salute. Alec didn’t think he was being snarky about it either.
“Come on.” Alec started back up the ramp.
Danny followed him and so did Rifle.
“Rifle, stay,” Alec commanded.
The dog looked at him with sad eyes and cocked his head to the side.
“You have to protect the girls and the house,” Alec told his pooch. “I need you to keep them safe.”
Rifle sat with a huff. The dog knew how to express himself quite clearly.
“Good boy.” Alec gave him a biscuit from one of his pockets and rubbed his head. “We won’t be long.”
Alec McGregor and Danny Cole left the house together, and Alec locked the door behind them.
“That won’t do much,” Danny said about the lock. “They go through the windows.”
“Maybe, but it’ll keep more punks like you from getting in.” Alec headed back toward the sidewalk. He was halfway to it when he noticed Danny had stopped. He turned and looked at the kid. He was staring at the teenager trapped by the garage.
“You should kill him.” Danny faced Alec.
“Come on kid.” Alec waved him along. “He can’t hurt anyone there.”
“He hurt your girlfriend.” Danny caught up with Alec.
“A) Michelle is not my girlfriend and B) I told her not to go near him, but she didn’t listen. If people are smart, he can’t hurt anyone.”
“But a lot of people are stupid,” Danny stated.
Alec didn’t argue with him.
8:
Alice
Alice picked a red square out of the bucket of pattern blocks and placed it next to the yellow shape she didn’t know the name of. The hex-a-thinger. Then she picked out a blue rom-something and put that next to the red square. Lastly, she put some green diamonds around the rest of the yellow thing.
“What are you making there, Alice?” Mrs. Lou kneeled down next to her.
“I don’t know,” Alice shrugged, “I think it’s a person.”
“It does look a little like a person.” Mrs. Lou pointed to certain shapes. “Here’s his head, his hair, his shoulders.”
“I think it’s a girl.” Alice liked girls better than she liked boys. Boys were gross and icky. They were also dumb.
“Yes, it could be a girl. We’re going to make some paintings soon. Do you want to paint?” Mrs. Lou asked.
“Yes!” Alice loved to paint.
She was about to get up but Mrs. Lou stopped her. “Put away the pattern blocks first, please.”
“Okay.” Alice started putting away the blocks while Mrs. Lou went to tell the other kids.
There weren’t very many kids in day-care today. Izzy, Lisa, Owen, Steven, Macy, Carol, both Joes, Betty, Ming, and Oscar all weren’t here today. They must be sick or their parents got the day off work. That sometimes happened. Even Alice’s Daddy sometimes got Saturdays off. She liked those days. She got to stay home and watch cartoons. Sometimes they’d go to the big park or Daddy would take her to a baseball game.
There were only four other kids here today. Judy, Frances, Lester, and Paul. Alice didn’t like Paul. He was mean. Judy was nice though, and she had very pretty hair. It was straight, red, long, and in a ponytail. Alice’s hair was blonde and it was all curly and she didn’t like it. Her Daddy told her that she looked like someone named Shirley Temple, but Alice didn’t know who that was.
Alice joined the other kids at the painting table with Mrs. Lou and put on her painting smock. At five years old, she thought of herself as a big girl and could put her smock on by herself, unlike four-year-old Lester who still needed help.
Mrs. Lou handed out paintbrushes to all the kids and put out the paint pots. Since there were so few kids today, nobody had to shar
e paint and everybody got an easel. Alice liked using the easels, which she called eels. They made her feel like a grown-up painter. Mrs. Lou attached a sheet of paper to Alice’s easel (eels) for her.
“What are we supposed to paint today, Mrs. Lou?” Frances asked. He always asked questions, even ones he should know the answers to.
“Today you get to paint whatever you want.” Mrs. Lou told them cheerily.
All the kids lit up at this idea. Normally they were told to paint their families, houses, or flowers. The prospect of painting anything filled them with glee.
Alice started painting her dog, Shoes. She loved Shoes very much; he was her best friend, after her Daddy, of course. But Daddy was Daddy, so Shoes was her best friend. Daddy told her that Shoes was a Basset Hound. Alice didn’t know what that meant, but loved the fact that he had floppy skin. Shoes was a brown dog, but Alice didn’t have brown paint, so she used red. He also had white feet, which was why he was named Shoes, but the paper was already white so she used blue for them.
While they were painting, Mrs. Lou went to the far corner of the room where a telephone was attached to the wall. It was too high up for Alice and the other kids to reach, but Mrs. Lou could reach it just fine. She made a telephone call on it, but spoke too quietly for Alice to hear. She looked sad though. Something about the phone call upset Mrs. Lou and she kept looking over at the children. She smiled at Alice briefly when she noticed she was looking, but then turned her back to her.
Paul reached over to Alice’s painting and put a big gob of purple across the side of Shoes’ head.
“Hey!” Alice turned to Paul. “You ruined my picture!”
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