Apocalypse Coming

by William Dunaway

  Seeing this live on TV, I was panicking. I kept trying to call Kim, but the circuits were busy. Kim at the same time had been trying to call me, with the same results.

  She had made it through the “Grandview Triangle” and was now heading south on I-49. She had to pass through Grandview going right next to the Landmark Shopping Center, then go through Belton, which was south and bordered Grandview. The traffic was still bumper to bumper, and they were only traveling about 20 mph.

  As she approached the off-ramp that went into the area of the shopping center, she could see the police cars had blocked off the overpass that crossed over I-49.

  I-49 itself was much lower than the business area where the shopping center was.

  She could hear gunshots. Suddenly, the line of cars in front of her came to a screeching stop. Several vehicles slammed into the vehicle in front of them. Kim didn’t hit the car in front of her, but the car behind her slammed into her.

  Apparently, when the shots started, a couple of vehicles slammed on their brakes causing the pileup. Going at a slower speed, not too much damage happened to any of the vehicles, but some of the drivers had jumped out and ran to the side of the road when they heard the gunfire. One of them had been hit by a car from a different lane, and the traffic just stopped.

  Finally, my attempt to call went through.

  Kim answered the phone in a very scared voice, “Vince, I’ve been involved in a pileup on the highway. I can hear gunshots. It sounds like a war going on. I don’t know what to do!”

  “Oh God! Where are you at exactly?”

  “I’m right at the overpass next to the shopping center.”

  I suddenly started shaking. I had always tried to protect Kim, but now I felt helpless that I couldn’t do anything.

  “You’re right where the riot is. There is an intense battle going on between the police and the scumballs. Can you go around?”

  “I…I…I don’t think so. The shoulder area is small, and one of the cars front end is sticking out into it.”

  The gunfire had quit, but she could hear the roar that almost sounded like a baseball stadium full of people. She looked up across the northbound lane and on the outer road, she saw three police cars flying up towards the overpass, heading towards the shopping area. As they approached, she could hear the crowd noise get louder.

  I was talking on the home phone, so while talking to Kim, I picked up my cell and sent a text to Blake, which read, “Kim’s in trouble, I need your help. Bring firepower and any help you can. ASAP.”

  I then asked Kim, “How far does the traffic jam extend in front of you? I mean, has the whole southbound lane stopped in front of the main crash?”

  “No, that traffic has moved on. It’s clear all the way down to the curve,” Then with even more panic in her voice, “OH GOD! There’s a big fight going on behind me. It looks like 4 or 5 people involved.”

  “This is what I want you to do. I don’t care if you have to push cars out of the way. Get out on the shoulder and go around and get the hell out of there.”

  Blake sent a text back saying “What? Where?”

  I replied “I need your help, now. PLEASE!”

  Blake replied, “On the way.”

  Kim declared “I can’t do that. I don’t want to mess up my car and...”

  “Are you crazy? To hell with the car. Kim, you must do this. As long as the car that’s sticking out in the shoulder has its front end facing away from you, your car will just push it out of the way. You’ll have to hit it hard, so don’t go slow. Hold on and don’t panic. YOU HAVE TO DO THIS!”

  Kim sat quietly for a moment, then replied, “Ok,” then said a silent prayer, “Christ, please help me.”

  She accelerated the car, clipping the back left corner of the car in front of her. She kept steady pressure on the accelerator as she approached the car sticking out. She slammed into the left front quarter panel of the car that was sticking out into the shoulder. She felt a big jolt and heard a large crunch. She kept her foot pressed down on the accelerator pushing the other car over to the right but at the same time, causing her to jerk to the left and almost hitting the center cement wall dividing the north and southbound lanes. She screamed when she hit the other car, but then a rush of relief came pouring over her as she realized she had made it past the crash site and was in the open lanes.

  I could hear the collision and heard her scream. I yelled.

  “Are you alright? Kim, are you alright? Kim! Kim!”

  She picked up the phone from her lap, “I made it. Thank you, God. Yes, I’m fine but the car is pulling badly to the right, and there is some grinding noise that’s coming from the front end.”

  “Is it drivable, though?”

  “Yes, if I don’t drive too fast.”

  I had the same rush of relief come over me.

  “Now listen. I’m going to start driving that way. I texted Blake, and he should be here any second. When I get cell service, I’ll call you back.”

  Our farm is in a low-lying area, and we don’t have cell service in the house unless we’re tied into the Wi-Fi. On the road, we don’t have reliable service until we get about 2 miles to the west, on higher ground.

  I continued, “Now, what I’m worried about is getting you back on the phone. I couldn’t get a hold of you earlier, due to busy circuits. Is the car holding up ok?”

  “I don’t know. The grinding noise is getting louder, and I have to fight it to keep it going straight down the road. I’ve made it to the Belton city limits, and it looks like it’s going to be back to bumper to bumper up ahead. The traffic is moving but not very fast. But it always slows down in that area because of the off-ramp to Belton.”

  “Alright, just in case, if the circuits are busy again, text. They say a text will go through when a call won’t. Now I want you to stay on 49. Once you get past the Belton exit, you should be ok, because then you’ll be out of the city area. We’ll come up 49, and if you do have any more problems with the car, we’ll see you alongside the road.”

  “Ok. I just want to get out of this area. The traffic is moving a little faster, and I’m approaching... NO! Oh God, not again! I can hear shots coming from up ahead on the right. It sounds like another damn war.”

  “Where are you at?”

  “I’m approaching Harold’s Super Center. You know that new sporting goods store. That’s where the shots sound like they’re coming from. Also, I can see police lights on the Belton exit overpass. That’s why the traffic is so slow; they have 49 blocked off. They’re making everyone take 168 St. exit which goes east into Belton and Raymore.”

  At that moment, Blake came barreling into the driveway, skidding on the rocks as he stopped. I went to the door and let him in while continuing to talk to Kim.

  “Damn, I’m not real thrilled about you driving through Belton. It connects with Raymore, and between both of them, you have to drive quite a ways through the city areas. This shit is going on all over the country. All the major cities are having riots. I guarantee this shit was planned. The Belton area used to be more of a country town, but anymore it’s part of the metro area.”

  Blake overhearing said “She’s in Belton? Right when I was leaving, there was a guy being interviewed on the news. He said he was just checking out at Harold’s Sporting Goods when he saw about 20 motorcycles pull up and they stopped right in front of the entrance. He said they all jumped off their motorcycles and ran through the doors and headed to the gun section. He said most of them were wearing gang type colors and covered in tattoos. He grabbed his stuff and just about the time he was going out the door, he started hearing a bunch of yelling. He said he stopped to listen for a minute and then he heard two gunshots. Apparently, that’s when he got out of there.

  When it went back to the news desk, they said that a large party of bikers were robbing the store of all sorts of weapons and ammunition and that they had killed a store clerk and a security guard. The police were informed, and most of the department
was waiting for them to come out of the store. When they did, it turned into a full-fledged gun battle that’s still going on.”

  “Did you hear that Kim?”

  “Yes, I could hear him. That’s what it was then and why they closed the highway.”

  I then told her, “Ok then, go through Belton and Raymore and out to Highway 291 but take the Pleasant Hill exit. I don’t want you going some other direction and us missing one another. Remember, there is a chance we won’t have cell service.”

  “OK, I’ll go through Pleasant Hill.”

  “Alright, we’re leaving right now. Be careful. I love you!”

  “I love you too.”

  Just as soon as I got off the phone, I asked Blake, “Want to take a ride?

  “That’s what I’m here for.”

  “Did you bring a gun?”

  “Of course.”

  “Good!” and ran into another room and came out with my M-4 and a .50 caliber sized ammo box that had 15 preloaded 30-round magazines of 62 Grain 5.56 rounds. I also strapped on my tactical holster, which held my Glock 22 along with four extra magazines.

  Blake laughed, “Damn dude, do you think we’re going to war?”

  “You never can tell. We’ll take my truck. I’ve got a tow strap just in case Kim’s car goes down. I don’t know what kind of shape it’s in. I’ll tell you about it during the ride up.”

  As we were walking out to the truck, Blake opened the door of his car, “Abel, Come! His Doberman Pinscher jumped out of the car, followed Blake over to the truck and jumped in when he opened the passenger door. When I got in, Abel was sitting in a forward position but looking right at me with an expression on his face like he was asking, “WHAT?”

  Blake chuckled, “He wanted to go for a ride today anyway.”

  I had seen and petted Abel many times while visiting Blake at his farm but meeting him literally face to face was a real eye-opener. This was one of the most intimidating Dobermans a person would ever see.

  “He’s more intimidating than my M-4 is,” and we drove out of the driveway, barely looking to see if it was clear.

  I was driving about 80 mph on every open stretch of road. I wasn’t taking the highway but every shortcut I knew. On some of the roads we went down, we wouldn’t have wanted to meet another oncoming truck on it as there probably wouldn’t have been enough room.

  Blake didn’t say anything about the speed as he drove for a living. It would take a lot more than this to shake him up.

  Once we made it to Pleasant Hill, I quit taking shortcuts. I knew with the speed I was driving earlier, there was no way that Kim could have made it this far yet. Now I had to make sure I was on the exact route that I told Kim to take.

  Kim, on the other hand, was making her way through Belton. Once again, travel was slow, due to all the traffic being re-routed from the highway. Most of the highway traffic eventually turned off though, trying to find a way to make it back to I-49.

  At the border of Belton, which eventually turns into Raymore, there are two 90-degree curves. After driving the first curves, she noticed that the local businesses were empty of any customers. As she made the second curve, she found out why.

  Just as soon as she made the curve, ahead of her on the left was a large protest going on in a shopping center parking lot. A confrontation seemed to be going on between the protesters and some of the local citizens that seemed to be blocking the demonstrators from doing any damage to the local stores. The scene was turning ugly. There was shoving and pushing and suddenly fights breaking out.

  Kim once again tried to call me, but the call wouldn’t go through, so she sent a text saying, “Trouble Raymore.” Kim prayed that I would receive the text.

  Kim was driving very slowly through the area, due to the traffic in front of her. Suddenly, the car directly in front of her slammed on its brakes. She could tell that it was being driven by an elderly couple. Ahead of the couple was another group of protestors that had stood shoulder to shoulder across the road, blocking the traffic.

  The protestors were chanting and yelling and refusing to move. The elderly couple tried to escape the area by inching their way through the line of people. This seemed to outrage the protestors, and several of them started beating on the couple’s car. Even though the couple stopped trying to drive through them, the protestors started rocking their car back and forth, side to side.

  Kim could see that the couple was frantic. The man driving the car started driving through the protestors again, which seemed to enrage them even more. Suddenly, one of the protestors smashed a brick on the windshield. The driver panicked and smashed down on the accelerator of his car. The car jumped forward slamming into several of the protestors. The impact of the car hitting the people caused one of them to do a complete flip in the air and landing on the side of the car. Others were shoved violently to the left and right. One had been run over, with the wheel running right over the man’s stomach. Because the driver couldn’t see through the windshield, his car hit the curb which caused the car to fly into the air and land on the other side of the sidewalk.

  Instead of the protestors trying to take care of their wounded, they turned even more violent and ran over to the elderly couple’s car and tried opening the doors. Several started smashing the windows with bricks and some clubs.

  Several vehicles behind Kim were banging into to each other, trying to turn around and leave the area. She was tempted to do the same, but all she could think about was the poor, elderly couple. She could see that the elderly lady was slumped over in her seat. She assumed that this was caused by the impact of the car hitting the curb and slamming down on the sidewalk. She couldn’t let anything else happen to the couple.

  She grabbed the Glock 26 that was in the console of the car, and then jumped out of the car and took two shots into the air. The crowd instantly stopped and looked over at her. She was now aiming the gun right at them yelling, “Leave them alone!”

  Many of them started running off in the opposite direction, but some just walked away grumbling and cursing. Four stood there, staring at her. They started walking towards her, and she took another shot at their feet.

  One turned around and ran away. Two stopped in their tracks. One fell to the ground screaming and grabbing his foot as the bullet ricocheted off the pavement and hitting him.

  Kim, still drawing down on them with her gun yelled, “Just get the hell out of here!”

  The two grabbed their friend and dragged him away.

  Someone had apparently got through to 911 as an ambulance had pulled up. They stopped short of the scene by about 100 yards and hesitated on going in. They looked at the car up on the sidewalk and saw the elderly man kneeling at the passenger door crying and trying to wake up his wife. The man saw the ambulance, and stood up, and started waving frantically at them. The crew decided to move on in, driving right by Kim, which was still holding the gun up towards the two men that were dragging their friend off.

  The ambulance crew started treating the elderly lady. Kim lowered her weapon, as the three men disappeared around a building.

  She walked over to the ambulance crew while they checked out the elderly lady. They had moved the lady down to the ground. Kim overheard one of the paramedics say, “Cardiac Arrest,” and they immediately started CPR.

  Suddenly, two shots rang out, one hitting the ambulance and missing Kim by only two feet. It seemed to have come from the area of the main crowd of protestors in the shopping center. Kim had forgotten all about them. She ducked down to the ground. The paramedics laid over the woman, trying to protect her. The husband stood there stunned, staring over in the direction the shots were coming from, until one of the paramedics swiped his arm across the back of the man’s knees, causing him to fall to the ground. “Stay Down!”

  Blake and I, not realizing that anything was going on, pulled up to a four-way stop, about ¼ of a mile to the east of the protest. Sitting at the stop sign, we could see the mob of protesters in the shoppi
ng center. We could also see the ambulance and noticed that the traffic, which should have been coming towards us, was stopped.

  “What the hell is going on up there?” Blake asked.

  “I don’t like it! That’s the way Kim would be coming from.”

  Suddenly we heard two shots ring out and we saw the crowd moving towards the ambulance. We could hear the roar of the crowd even from that far away.

  “You drive,” and I grabbed my M-4 and jumped in the bed of the truck.

  Blake cautiously drove up to the scene. I was standing up behind the cab of the truck, holding my M-4 down on top of the cab. About 200 yards from the area, I could see Kim’s car in the middle of the road, I then saw the two paramedics laying over someone. I screamed to Blake “Go!” Blake floored the truck and came to a screeching stop close to the ambulance.

  I was panicking because I couldn’t see Kim and was scared to death that the person the paramedics were laying over was her. Just about the time I was getting ready to jump out of the bed and run over to the ambulance, I saw Kim looking around the corner of it, waving at me.

  The mob was yelling and moving even closer to the ambulance, and some were throwing bottles and even bricks. I shot three shots into the air. The loud boom of the M-4 stopped them in their tracks. Blake jumped out of the truck and hopped into the bed as well.

  I yelled “Back off. Move away from the ambulance.” Both of us scanned the crowd moving our M-4’s with our head movement.

  Most of the crowd ran back to the parking lot of the shopping center, but a smaller group started backing away very slowly, and I heard the remark, “Fuck him! That motherfucker ain’t going to shoot nobody.”

  Suddenly from the right, a brick came flying, bouncing off the cab of the truck and missing Blake by only a few inches. Blake and I both looked over and saw a man with another brick in his hand.