Devastated Lands: A Post-Apocalyptic Adventure

by Bruce W. Perry

  In minutes, ahead of him, he saw a bridge over the avenue. The water height was fairly high up on the superstructure and pylons for the bridge. He thought if he could get over to the side far enough, he could reach up and grab part of the structure, like the edge of a girder. But the bridge came up too fast and he swam hard laterally and missed it. Soon he was well past the bridge with the warped sensation of going downhill in water in the darkness.

  The flood had become a kind of waterfall. He was conscious of the chance of being driven into underwater structures and breaking bones and being crushed and drowning, at the same time as he thought about Amy, Mikaela, and Turk. He'd kept looking for the canoe all around, as he was shunted through the floodwaters and fought to stay on the surface. He thought of Amy standing in the flowers, calling for Turk.

  Another bridge came up in his vision, perhaps two blocks away. He was floating west; light began to leak into the city, and across the waters. He was faintly conscious of the sun coming up, like a shade being partially drawn up on everything.

  This time he was about ten feet closer to the edge, and he went for it. It was an all-out sprint as the second bridge approached. A bit of the structure hung down close to the water surface. He thought of distressing videos he'd watched of people trapped in floods, the water brown and just their heads showing.

  He reached up with his right arm, timing it just so, and he grabbed a metal pipe as he passed beneath it. He swung his other hand around and snagged the pipe, as his legs were being swept downstream. Water pressure flowed and pulled all around him. Now he was in a pull-up position. His legs still dangled below. But he pulled himself up to his chest and swung a leg around the pipe.

  Finally, he was breathless and completely out of the water, which flew by beneath him. His heart pounded almost through his chest; he coughed convulsively and started to laugh, with a brief instantaneous joy.

  CHAPTER 49

  He lay on the pipes and rested for he didn't know how long. Then he started climbing.

  It was hand over hand with holds to grasp, not like rock-wall climbing, which he had a lot of experience with. He took his time. He got higher on the bridge. He could see the whole route they had taken in the canoe, and thought he saw the building they'd paused in.

  It was easier climbing as the light blossomed. Just like with rocks, he made sure he had a firm hold at all times with at least one foot and hand. He looked above him and saw a fairly complex maze of girders.

  He was pretty sure there was a road, at least a sidewalk, along the top of the bridge. There was going to be a hard part just beneath the top, a complicated, tough problem for a climber. He might have to be hanging upside down; he looked at it a few times and thought about how he'd do it. Then he looked around, and Tacoma's skyline emerged, sunlight glancing off a few taller buildings. The sky was dark blue and stained brown in places as it lit up.

  He began to feel the exertion of the climb, a kind of exhaustion that hung outside himself. It made him feel fragile; he cried quietly, in mourning. He thought of the peril the others have been in, and were in. As he hung there and looked for other holds, he watched the water below, swollen, black, and ugly.

  He thought he'd done well to get out of it; that was a good move with the pipe and the strength of his upper body and his will to pull himself out of the damned, hellish water. Yet, it had all been ruined because he'd lost the others. A part of him wanted to just let go. Drop back in, close his eyes. That can be good, sometimes, he reasoned, picturing the scenes of their suffering over the past weeks.

  You're mad, he thought to himself. You're descending into a silly madness. Just finish this. Just finish this piece in front of you, this climb. Finish what you started, then you can think about more personal suffering and guilty self torture.

  He kept climbing. The rust from the girders and pipes was all over his hands; he was already forming callouses. Then suddenly the sun was in his eyes; it was fully up. The light warmed his face, his upper body. He paused with his hands on the metal. He could see Rainier in blazing sunlight when he looked east, and it was still a mountain.

  CHAPTER 50

  He was just beneath a metal lattice-work that had a railing above it. He reached up, and it was one big move using only his arms. He has no business making this move, and winning it, he thought. He has nothing left in his arms; the muscles have tanked.

  The floodwaters churned below, breaking up against the bridge's pylons.

  Then he was hanging by his arms and his legs dangled and he hooked a leg up and into the lattice-work, with the toe of his soggy shoe. Then he had an arm over the railing and he flung himself over and onto the road.

  He lay on the road on his back, bruised, soaked, tired, and aching. Even though it was pavement, it felt good, as though he'd been poured on it.

  Nothing came down the road. The sun was bright; it made vivid red and yellow spots behind his eyes. Then he opened his eyes and forced himself into a sitting position, and on to his feet.

  He began to trudge down the middle of the road. It was empty, pot-holed, and dusty, with a vacancy suggesting disuse. From his vantage point on the bridge, he watched the floodwaters drain westward through the abandoned city blocks. The rooftops were empty, the buildings were dark. A black loneliness swept through him, as if Shane, for so long the loner's loner, could never tolerate being alone again.

  He recalled a mountain-guide friend's comment once, weary of his affluent clients, that "people aren't tough anymore."

  "Well I'm tough," Cooper said out loud, still walking, a staggering swagger. "Mikaela's tough. And Amy's tough, too."

  He saw a vehicle coming down the road, from a mile away. It had a rotating red light on it. The van quickly came closer, raising some dust. He stood in the middle of the road and waved his arms over his head.

  ###

  He rode in the back, with the EMTs. They took him to the Port of Tacoma, where thousands of people had gathered; the missing, and the people searching for the missing. The flood played itself out; the brackish water poured into the port and continued out into the Pacific Ocean.

  An EMT in the vehicle checked out his vitals. She gave him a liter of electrolyte drink, two ibuprofens and a handful for the road, as well as a protein bar. She carefully patched up several scabbed and irritated punctures and bruises. To Cooper, she radiated trust, kindness, professionalism.

  "Where are you from?" he said.

  "Originally? Costa Rica."

  "What's your name?"

  "Consuela," she said. "Yours?"

  "Cooper."

  "You're not in bad shape, Cooper. Considering." He nodded.

  He asked them if they'd seen a canoe with a lady, a young girl, and a dog, but they said no and he could inquire after them at the Port of Tacoma. Consuela was so kind and together, he thought, that she appeared to single-handedly restore his confidence in official order, but he figured that this was partly, or mostly, because of his exhaustion.

  They arrived at the port, and while there was some kind of agency task force manned by various uniformed personnel, it was mostly the Red Cross. He recognized the tents. Hundreds, thousands of people were milling around. Vacant-eyed, bedraggled like him; some having intense conversations. He wasn't used to crowds; it seemed months he'd wandered the wasteland. Someday, he vowed, he'd piece together the whole thing; how many hours he'd spent in Rainier's devastating shadow.

  When he went outside, he immediately saw a long row of dark green body bags, tagged and laid out on the tarmac. He went over to a pole, leaned on it, and had a huge dizzy spell. Consuela walked over to him; she had a Navy Blue uniform and pretty black hair and a patch that read "Rodriguez."

  "Are you okay, Cooper? Want to lie down?"

  "No. I'm alright." It's the fucking body bags, he wanted to say; then he did say that to her, out loud.

  "Oh." She looked at them with an empathic, fretful concern, then she said, "Try that tent over there. You might find someone there. If you don't, c
ome back and see me." The white tent had the big red recognizable logo.

  He walked over there, thrusting his shoulders back. "C'mon, man," he muttered to himself, trying to get composed and talk himself out of despair. "C'mon, man, get your shit together." He entered the tent and walked, almost aimlessly, into a crowd. He looked around.

  In a few minutes, someone tapped him on the back. He turned around. "Hey-a Coop." It was Amy; her face was covered in chocolate ice cream and she wore some kind of paper hat.

  "Oh God," Cooper said, dropping to one knee, clutching her by the shoulders. "Oh my God. Amy." His eyes misted up. When he looked up, he saw Mikaela striding toward them with Turk straining on a leash. A Red Cross lady came over with a clipboard; she waited with an official, patient smile.

  "Mikaela."

  "Shane Cooper," Mikaela said, with a tone that someone would use with "Well if it isn't…"

  "You…"

  "They picked us up, in the same kind of boat that almost ran us down."

  Then the lady with the clipboard said, "Well, you two obviously know each other," nodding to Cooper and Amy. He hugged her and stood up. The lady turned to Mikaela.

  "You must be Mommy."

  Mikaela's face opened up from its determined weariness; she looked down at her feet and smiled. Cooper walked over to her and hugged her, then the three of them, with Turk, made their way together to the exit for the tent, where the sunshine flooded through.

  CHAPTER 51

  They walked for almost an hour through a dense, restive crowd, driven by an energy fueled by survival. The ice cream the Red Cross had given them provided short-term fuel to burn. They chewed every last bite of the cones, and were left with fingers sticky with chocolate.

  They found a place to sleep. Mikaela and Shane collapsed into an open space with longer grass. A sea breeze blew lightly over everything. They tied Turk up with some old clothesline they'd used as a leash, and left Amy to play with her dolls nearby. Both of them involuntarily passed out.

  Cooper woke up in the sun near some picnic tables. He was still in the sway of the anxious dream he'd just had. He'd lost Mikaela and Amy in this huge refugee camp, and while searching for them became lost himself, in dark urban alleys and on escalators to nowhere. He sat up and looked at both of them silently.

  "Jesus, that was so realistic," he said.

  "What?" Amy said, looking at him critically.

  "Nothing. I thought you guys were gone."

  Mikaela was still asleep. He thought she looked serene. Amy went back to what she was doing. He found her play, as if nothing out of the ordinary had just taken place, reassuring. She shrugged off trauma, as if it was only the last night's bad dream. It must be the nature of childhood, he thought.

  He stood up and took in the vast encampment. It was jammed up against the windswept bay and spilled over into the hillsides and the few streets that weren't flooded. Small FEMA towns–clusters of bland white cubicle shelters–shared the space with Red Cross tents and a vast assemblage of small campsites. It looked like a ghetto, something from Third World disasters.

  "I'm going to get more food, from that tent over there," he said to Amy. "Don't move. Keep Turk company." He had to talk to Mikaela, but she was still sleeping. He didn't know what her plans were. He had an idea, but he couldn't read her mind. She was headstrong. Would she want to head to Spokane and look for her boyfriend?

  "Don't worry Coop! Right, Millie?" Amy said. "We're not going anywhere. We don't have a car!"

  "Good."

  She held Millie up so that the doll would do the talking. "But I wanna get out of here. This place is too crowded. We don't have a roof or a house. It smells. I'm sick of this yucky food–mac and cheese and salad, ONLY. Mac and cheese and mac and cheese and mac…"

  "Alright Millie that's enough," Shane said, faintly irritated. "It's better than no food, right? Better than floating through the city? I'll be right back."

  Just then he noticed Mikaela waking up and moving into a cross-legged position. Her hair was all pressed together on one side, but her expression was gratified and rested. He felt good for her.

  "Where are you going?"

  "I'm scoping things out, looking for more food, seeing what's next."

  "Okay," she said, rubbing the sleep out of her eyes. "I was really zonked out there…"

  Amy held Millie up and fluttered her about. "Something other than mac and cheese, please."

  "You got ice cream didn't you?"

  Then Amy's voice dropped into a mechanical, robotic one.

  "More ice cream more ice cream please sir. Please please please."

  "I'll see what I can do," Shane said, suddenly feeling like a mildly harried parent.

  He walked through the crowd, careful to remember where he left the others. He felt refreshed, almost but not quite aimless. He was over the virus. He heard music, strumming guitars, over behind a tent. A small group played two guitars and one man drummed expertly on an overturned white utility pail.

  They had a fire going. Shane quickly scanned the sea of humanity for the signs of a large horse ridden by a tall man in a hat. He was confident that Bea and Drake had made it.

  He stood off to the side and listened. A couple of young free spirits were dancing around the fire, Woodstock like. Naked children played; for the moment, they seemed like festival-goers, not victims or refugees.

  A man with a beard and a mud-stained t-shirt handed him a leather pouch.

  "Have some, dude."

  Shane's expression was taken for reluctance, because the man said, "It's only sangria. You have to trust me on that one. Sweet, tangy, and weak. No tequila, Scotch, or fine wine available. It's nectar of the gods. You'll see."

  "Okay." He threw the pouch back and quaffed a mouthful. Just as advertised, it was delicious. He took another one and handed it back.

  "Thanks. That's really good."

  "Pleasure dude."

  "Where'd you come from?"

  "Oregon, on the coast near Portland."

  "Really? Why'd you come here?"

  "You haven't heard, man? They've had devastating earthquakes in NorCal and Oregon. Nine point oh, big time. Everything's shutdown. We drove north in a VW van until we ran out of diesel. Then Rainier blows it top. What a trip brother!"

  He made it seem like some kind of adventure road trip out of Kerouac or Kesey, but Cooper appreciated the hippy vibe. It lightened things up.

  "So going south is out, I guess."

  "I wouldn't. All you're going to find is this."

  "How are you traveling?"

  "Don't know yet. Hitchhiking? We're just going to sit tight until we can cop some kind of a ride on a bus or something."

  Cooper was half tempted to rally his gang and join this man on the Electric Koolaid Acid Test, but figured it was wiser to keep his options open.

  "Well, thanks for the wine. I better be moving."

  "Be cool, brother." They shook hands, then Cooper wandered to the next Red Cross tent, where he came up empty, but he found food at the next one.

  He took three brown paper bags back to where he found the others sitting on the grass. A woman at the last Red Cross tent, where he found the food, said there were no beds left there, but that they could occupy a corner of the tent if they needed shelter. Cooper looked at the sky, and at the moment it was nice. It was late afternoon and the sun began to dip toward the flat, blue horizon.

  The air was clean, cool like autumn. He sat down with the others, and they quietly inspected the contents of the prepackaged bags. He felt lucky and safe; maybe they could leave it to the morning to find out about a boat sailing north.

  CHAPTER 52

  The bags had turkey, lettuce, tomato sandwiches, and potato chips. Real turkey, even with a slice of swiss cheese with it. They ate in reverent silence, except for Amy who had a faux spat with Millie about her food. She accused the doll of trying to steal her sandwich. Cooper looked at Mikaela with a half smile.

  "We can sleep in that tent
tonight. Then maybe leave in a day or two. Do you know where you want to go?"

  "Out of this place," she said, without leaving much room for compromise. "I heard there might be a train going north. It used to only be used for freight. But they're outfitting freight cars for people, at least according to this guy I talked to. Many roads are out, and there's no gas for cars. So otherwise we're stuck."

  "Where's the train go?" Cooper asked.

  "Possibly as far as Vancouver."

  He launched into his sandwich. For once, it felt like they had options. One thing he was sure of; he wanted all of their options to involve him and Mikaela staying together.

  "I thought of renting a vehicle to carry all of us," he said. I still have my wallet and credit card, believe it or not. I just don't know how soon things will be reconstituting themselves here in Tacoma and Seattle."

  He knew he was treading on thin ice; Mikaela wanted to go, not wait for days on end. She'd been clear on that.

  She quietly ate her sandwich with her legs crossed, then said "I don't know if the mountain is done yet. We don't even know of it's safe to stay here."

  They both stole a wary glance toward Rainier. A gray bulbous cloud, like a permanent thunderstorm, remained hovering over its gouged out slopes.

  The sun emerged from behind a cloud, and Mikaela lay back with her hands behind her head.

  "I could go back to sleep. For a long time. I really could."

  "Feel free to do that. I'll wake you up when the time comes."

  Turk sat down beside her, then laid down so his back was touching her legs. Cooper tossed him a portion of a turkey slice, and he caught it in mid air and chomped it down violently.

  After about an hour of lolling and napping in the waning sunlight, Cooper came up on one elbow.

  "Mikaela?"

  She opened her eyes. "Yeah."

  "You want to stay together, right? I mean, after we leave here. You're not thinking of splitting up, are you?"

  She went up on her own left elbow and faced him.