Yield

by Johnson, Bryan K.

  He glances over to Devin and the carnage now surrounding him. “Let’s get her out of here,” Chris says. “We can make it back to the freeway farther south.”

  Another shadow stumbles forward into the harsh red light. Abd looks around at the murderous scene, his shaking right hand gripping the metal shiv from the plane. The Arab stops several feet behind Devin, his eyes transfixed by the dark liquid seeping out from under the fireman’s twitching seat. “Allah be merciful.”

  Devin blinks. Civility and reason can’t seem to push the rage and violence from his mind. He looks down at the horrific body in front of him, his eyes finally starting to focus. The fireman scrambles back into the darkness, fumbling for several unused shells between the spreading pools of death.

  He backs away from the lifeless remains, a spattered shotgun still in his trembling grip. The road flare begins to burn blood-red as they leave the alley and run towards the south. Behind them the phosphorous light sputters, silhouetting the bodies once again before taking the dead with it into the black.

  Part Three: Survival

  “These are they which came out of great tribulation, and have washed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.”

  -REVELATION 7:14

  Chapter 24

  The sharp hiss of an incandescent bulb pops on inside the Banes’ dark living room. Katherine’s eyes drift down to the soundly sleeping eight-year-old on the couch. She kneels, laying a hand on Tyler’s ruddy blond hair. Kat kisses his forehead, just like she’s done so many times before the chaos of today. She lingers longer than usual, letting the boy’s adventurous scents fill her nose. It’s a combination of maple trees, bark dust, and baseball fields, mixed with a healthy dose of stubbornness he inherited from his father.

  She takes a small medical pouch out of her purse and unzips it. A lock of golden hair tumbles over her ear before she can tuck it back. Kat pulls out two vials of insulin, her eyes narrowing. Holding the glass containers up, the small amount of liquid in the bottom barely catches the light from the lamp beside her.

  Katherine looks down at her son. Pride and concern fill her hazel eyes. She sets the boy’s life sentence down on the end table with a clink, fighting back a growing fear.

  She takes Tyler’s wrist and turns it over. Thank God…

  The blood sugar levels on his GlucoWatch have held steady at 110 for the past two hours. She smiles, sinking into the couch like a deflated balloon. Katherine pushes the delicate curls of hair back from his eyes. A faint smile creases the corners of his mouth.

  The color of his skin is no longer an ashen gray. It’s still a shade or two away from normal, but imperceptible to anyone other than his mother. To her, it’s a warning sign as clear as day of what could have happened. Katherine knows every tint of her children. Every pain. Every scar. Being a stay-at-home mom has been the most joyous, difficult, and exhaustively fulfilling thing she has ever done. At times, she’s been happier than words could describe. At others, she’s cracked, splintered under the self-induced pressures of perfection. She’s even thought of leaving a few times—actually walking away from it all and giving up everything just so she could experience the things she never got to. Devin proposed to her when they were only kids themselves. So long ago… They were different people back then.

  Looking back at it all through the tempered lens of days like this one, though, she would fight to the death for every second with her kids. With Devin…

  * * *

  “Hey, Mom,” Tyler’s hoarse voice whispers. He’s been watching his mother’s napping breaths for several minutes now, curled up next to him on the couch. The boy smiles. Just having her there fills him with a sense of calm and confidence.

  “How you feeling, baby?” Kat asks. She sits up quickly, unsure of how she was even able to fall asleep.

  “Wonderful.” Tyler forces another smile. His eyelids feel so heavy. He tries to blink away the immense muscular fatigue from his convulsions, but his eyes just keep wanting to close.

  “Liar,” Katherine laughs. “Do you remember what happened?”

  “Some,” the boy says. He tries to scoot himself up on the couch, but his face quickly betrays the pain.

  “Easy, Ty,” Kat pleads. She puts a protective hand to his chest.

  “I’m fine,” he insists. Tyler rearranges the pillows behind him, forcing himself upright with a grunt.

  Katherine’s eyebrow raises, but she stays silent.

  “I was okay when I got to school,” Tyler says. “But then I started feeling a little light-headed in homeroom.”

  “Did you tell the nurse?”

  He sees weakness mirrored in his classmates’ eyes. “I drank some water,” Tyler says, his face hardening, “and it mostly went away.”

  “You still should have told somebody,” Kat continues. Her eyebrow shoots up again.

  “I know. But then they made some sort of coded announcement over the loudspeaker, and Miss Woods told us to get under our desks for a special drill. I didn’t want to make a big deal out of it.”

  The faces of children fill Katherine’s mind. All across the country, they crawl under the illusory safety of their desks. Their voices are heartbreaking. At first they laugh, enjoying this new and exciting game…then, suddenly, they all cry out. The choir of screaming promise is silenced as nuclear detonations tear their schools apart.

  A shiver shoots down the back of her neck.

  “Well, it is a big deal, kiddo. You could have…” Her voice trails off again. She can still feel her son’s pale body twitching and writhing in her arms on the classroom floor. She pulls the quilt up higher to her chest.

  “I’m sorry,” Tyler whispers.

  “I know,” Kat scolds. Fear flashes in her eyes. “But we’ve been over this before. You can still do the things you want. You just have to monitor yourself. Alright?” She pulls out a fingertip glucose tester from the medical kit and grabs the GlucoWatch on her son’s wrist. “That’s what these are for.”

  “Okay.” The word comes out with obedient annoyance, anxious to be done with the lecture.

  “Thank you.” Katherine leans down and kisses her son’s forehead again, trying to balance out the discipline with love. “Oh, and don’t ever scare Haley like that again. Your poor sister didn’t stop crying for an hour.”

  Tyler quickly looks up at her. Lately, the only one-on-one time he’s had with his sister has ended in violence and retribution. “Haley?!”

  “I believe that is her name. Yes.” Katherine stands up to start dinner. She pulls the blanket up to her son’s neck and delicately tucks the bottom under his legs.

  “So, what happened anyway?” Tyler asks. His stomach begins to churn even before the words leave his mouth. He knows it was something major but prepares himself for the usual censored explanation so customary of adults.

  “I don’t know.” Kat stops, her hands freezing on the blanket. “I heard bits and pieces, but a lot of the radio and TV stations aren’t working right now. None of it makes any sense.”

  “Was it terrorists?” Tyler probes.

  “We don’t know.”

  “Did they hit New York again?”

  “Yeah, baby. They did.” Katherine runs her fingers comfortingly through his hair. “Some other cities, too.”

  “Close to here?” Tyler asks. Worry spreads across his eyes.

  Katherine looks down at her intelligent detective, knowing she’s already said too much. She hesitates.

  “Seattle?”

  Kat looks sharply back at him. His eyes beg for answers. It ages him somehow, making Tyler seem so much older than the worries of an eight-year-old should.

  Katherine sighs. “Yeah,” she whispers.

  “Is Dad okay?” Tyler’s eyes fill with tears.

  Katherine sits down and puts an arm around her son. “I don’t know, Ty.”

  “Did he call?”

  “The phones are all down. Cell lines are busy,” Katherine says. Her heart flutters, tryi
ng to convince itself. “I’m still trying though, baby.”

  Tyler pushes out of the hug and looks up. “We need to go find him,” he pleads. “He might need us. We could…”

  “Settle down now,” Katherine soothes. She gently takes the boy’s shoulders and helps him to lay back. Kat looks down proudly at her fireman in the making. Her smile lights up the room. “You’ve got your Dad’s heroics in you. I’ll give you that. You’d probably hitchhike the whole way, too.”

  Kat forces the fear from her eyes. She smooths down the curls in her son’s hair, trying to set his turbulent world at ease. She pulls the quilt back up to Tyler’s chest. “Send him a prayer, Ty.” Katherine leans down and kisses his forehead. “Send us all some prayers while you’re at it. The world could sure use them right now.”

  Chapter 25

  Footsteps slowly shuffle along the moonlit streets of Seattle. Isabel and Chris walk on either side of Terra through pockets of clouded shadow. A voice behind them prays in Arabic for peace in the night.

  The steel barrel of a shotgun glimmers in Devin’s hands, several feet to the front. The fireman stares without expression at the rugged city blocks ahead. Blood spatters now stain his unbuttoned white dress shirt—the shirt he wore for an interview in the city that no longer exists.

  His normally cheerful green eyes flicker. Storms build just below the surface, testing him. Always testing him. Murderer… He grits his teeth to quiet the voices. He pleaded…begged. But you still pulled the trigger…over…and over…

  Devin glances down into the open bag slung over his shoulder. A long, square bottle sparkles back in the blue moonlight. The amber liquid swirls inside, beckoning like an old friend too long forgotten. It’s alright. You just need to relax….

  He pulls out the bottle of Jack Daniel’s and stares at the familiar black label for a moment. The voices are all suddenly silent.

  Devin cracks the seal and takes an exploratory drink. Soothing fires of ignorance cascade down inside of him. His eyes close. Blissful oblivion slows his stride. The fireman takes deep advice from Jack’s beloved counsel. Devin lets the liquid burn in his mouth before slowly allowing it to pass. Hello, old friend. I’ve missed you…

  The elated feeling of warmth pours through his entire body. It flows down through his tingling nerves and wraps his skin in an ephemeral embrace. All noise slowly fades. All panic, all regret, washes away.

  “Yeah, that’ll make it better,” Isabel shouts. She shakes her head disapprovingly. They cross several more blocks before Devin’s fevered drinking pace finally slows. The buzzed fireman turns and smiles back.

  “Done yet?” Isabel scolds. Her eyes could cut metal.

  “Let him be,” Chris whispers. His own demons claw from just within.

  As the blocks continue on, an eerie feeling grows inside Isabel. She looks around. The streets feel uncomfortably deserted. Her sharp Latino eyes see nothing. All life seems to have abandoned the dark shadows of this neighborhood.

  They approach a series of fences lined with razor-wire surrounding the remnants of a massive government building. Its security gate stands unmanned. Several holes are ripped into the fence on either side. The sounds of cut metal scraping against itself in the wind are chilling, like daggers sliding along exposed bone.

  SKRIT….SKRIT………….

  Chris looks over at a rusted sign. Spray-painted graffiti tags now partially obscure it.

  KING COUNTY DETENTION CENTER

  The 6’7” teenager feels his stomach tighten. His eyes dart across the streets. “It’s not much longer to the freeway,” Chris says. He forces Isabel and Terra to quicken their pace. “Pick it up unless you want to walk alone,” he yells back to Abd.

  The Arab’s muttered prayer trails off as he lumbers forward to join the others. The buildings rise higher beside them. They cast deep lines of black along the silvery sheen of the roadway.

  Suddenly, Isabel gasps. The faint glint of eyes moves through an alley to their left. She stops, trying to distinguish shapes in the dark. Only the shadows stare back at her.

  The silence around them grows. The deadly still is unnerving. She begins walking again, her eyes darting from side to side.

  The sound of shuffling feet echoes out of an alley mouth fifteen paces to their right. The flight attendant spins, reaching for Chris’s arm. “You hear that?”

  Chris strains to look into the shadows on his side. Nothing moves.

  “I heard it, too,” Abd says. He digs inside his left arm sling for the sharp metal shiv.

  Chris gazes into the black for another moment. His heart pounds. Several hulking shapes shift within the darkness. Squinted eyes shine back at him. More appear, growing in the shadows.

  “Come on,” Chris barks. He pushes the two women forward, quickly closing the ground to the shotgun in Devin’s hands.

  The fireman clutches tightly to a half-consumed bottle of liquor in the other hand. A narcissistic haze clouds his emerald eyes.

  “We gotta get out of here,” Chris whispers.

  Devin keeps walking, lost in his own dark thoughts. They’re slowing you down, mate. You could get home a lot blooming faster without four ungrateful chains dangling from your knickers. The drunken fireman stumbles on. Cracks in his slick black dress shoes scrape along the roughened pavement. They’re not worth it. They’re strangers. Scrape ‘em off.

  “Devin!” Chris says more intensely. The writhing motions of darkness are coming to life all around them.

  “Damn it, Devin,” Isabel shouts, her strong eyes filling with tears. “Don’t go off on us now!”

  “I’m not your bloody leader, alright?” Devin slurs. He continues on, barely turning toward her. “I do enough babysitting at home.”

  Chris grabs the fireman’s shoulder and pulls him around. His voice lowers to an angry rumble. “Look around, man. We’re not the only ones out here!”

  Devin’s unfocused eyes stare past him. Without sympathy. Without concern. A growing part of him is ready to be done with the stragglers and all of the problems they’ve brought. The thought lingers, festering. An overwhelming desire to see his family washes over him.

  “Not my problem, mate,” Devin snaps. He pushes the hands away with his shotgun and starts unsteadily forward again. His pace quickens.

  Family. It’s all he wants to get back to. Images of their smiling faces and the memories of a life so far away rip through Devin’s mind. They pull his feet towards home like an irresistible magnet. If only he were free, he could run—force his body to endure and soon feel the love of their forgiving embrace… They need you…

  Without a moment’s hesitation, Abd moves past the others. The Arab’s thin legs churn to catch up with the man now carrying their best chance for survival.

  “Where you going?” Chris yells. Rage pulses from his eyes. “Don’t you leave us!” He watches in disgust at the dimming shapes of both men. They stumble away faster into the night, all hope leaving with them. “Damn towelhead,” he mutters through clenched teeth. “You better run.”

  The basketball star’s palms begin to sweat. His heart thunders inside his chest. The thought of enduring the unknown, waiting within the dead city’s abyss, sends ice shooting through his veins.

  “Devin!” Isabel yells after them. Her echoes are the only response from the black. Terra begins to shake violently in her arms. Isabel pulls the girl closer. “Easy now,” she soothes, wiping away the tears now flowing freely down both of their faces.

  Terra’s sapphire eyes look on in terror at the shadows closing in all around.

  Dark shapes continue to move and spread throughout the black, eager to feast upon the dissent of the living. Thick clouds creep in front of the waning moon, plunging the ruins into nothingness. A horde of eyes begins to flicker in the night, advancing on their prey.

  Chapter 26

  “Wait up!” Abd yells, trying to catch up with the lumbering strides of the firefighter.

  The redhead just moves faster. His ste
eling green eyes push out all emotion. They can’t expect you to hold their hands, he justifies. It’s not your responsibility. They’ll be fine. You have to get home to Katherine and the kids…

  The frightened looks on the faces he abandoned still flash in Devin’s mind. They gnaw at his soul, pleading for him to stay. He washes the thought down with some of Jack’s familiar warmth. Devin forces his legs to run. His muscles burn, driving away the pain of this city. He races faster and faster toward the happiness of home.

  The inviting picket fence and barbeques with the neighbors—cares of suburbia now seem a lifetime away. Paying bills and making sure the kids do their chores, even dealing with the PTA’s disdainful looks after punching out another one of Haley’s delinquent boyfriends; that world feels like an elusive paradise now. The good and bad of daily life have forever been put into a new perspective.

  Abd flies past the distracted man, moving surprisingly fast for his haggard build. Suddenly, the Arab turns and stops. The tip of his twisted metal knife is raised, pointing hesitantly at Devin’s chest. “When you save a life, you become responsible for it,” Abd says, his shoulders heaving.

  Devin slows. The serrated sheet-metal edge sparkles dangerously in the moonlight. “Not in my religion, bloke.” The fireman stuffs the bottle of whiskey back into his bag. “But if you stop me from getting to my family again,” his emerald eyes flash, “you may just get to meet your precious Allah.”

  “You could have left everyone to burn back on the plane,” Abd says. “I did…” His dark sockets lower to the ground. “But you didn’t, Devin. You’re not a bad man. Don’t become one just when you’re needed most.”

  The fireman cocks the shotgun and levels it into Abd’s face. “Did you not see what we did behind that grocery store, mate?” Devin growls. “To protect the people I care about, I’ll do whatever it takes.”