Dawn of Destruction

by Ronald Williams

  A shout.

  “Hey! You! Stop and get those hands in the air.”

  Shit. Sam kept moving. He pretended to stumble, just enough to bring his hand to the pavement...

  “He's going for the weapon! Open fire!”

  An assault rifle coughed, and a bullet ricocheted off the street. Ratatatat, more rounds zipped through the air around him. Sam launched into a sprint, forgetting the gun. Up the street, two Guardsmen were strafing and tracking Sam with their rifles. The other four were still occupied with the trio of looters. Sam shot into an alley on the opposite side of the street. Bullets striking the wall threw chips of brick into Sam's face. He kept running, wheeling into a cross alley, and crashed headlong into a body.

  Sam tumbled to the ground, rolled, came up in a crouch, already pulling the hatchet from his waist. The person he'd collided with spun twice and then regained their footing. It was a woman, her clothes tattered, her blonde-hair streaked almost black with oil and grit. She sank low and eyed Sam with a wild, feral look. Sam saw terror in her eyes, but no murder. Around the corner, footsteps echoed in the alley.

  “This way, he went this way,” one of the Guardsmen called out.

  Sam backed away from the woman slowly. Her eyes were locked on the hatchet in Sam's hand. She was just trying to survive, same as him.

  “Get out of here,” Sam whispered to her, lowering the hatchet. He turned and ran down the alley, away from the approaching Guardsmen.

  Sam finally allowed himself to slow when he was two blocks away. His side ached and his head was beginning to pound from thirst and exertion, but even so he kept up a brisk walking pace for three more blocks, sticking to alleys when he could and staying tight up against the brick building faces when he was forced to go out on an open city street. The sun was well below the tops of the tallest buildings, sending bright rays of light slicing in between block-wide puddles of shadow.

  The deeper he plunged into the city, the worse the conditions grew. Cars here weren't simply dented and smashed – many were burned-out husks, some of them still smoking. If a window wasn't smashed, it was heavily boarded and covered with hand-painted “Looters will be shot on sight” signs. Many of the storefronts with signs had been broken into regardless of the warning. Trash and debris littered the streets, and the roving gangs of marauders became more frequent. The deepening dusk made it easier to get out of side, but it also meant that Sam often couldn't see a group of looters until they were almost right on top of him.

  Occasional bursts of gunfire echoed out from nameless streets, giving Sam the eerie, unnerving feeling that he was smack-dab in the middle of a warzone. It was a bad place to be with just a knife and a rusty hatchet for company. What was it they said about bringing a knife to a gunfight...?

  Even though he was forced to wind his way through the city, taking advantage of cover wherever it presented itself, Sam had still been cutting a fairly direct path across the maze of city streets. Some roads and landmarks had changed since his time on the force – it happened in any city – but Sam was able to keep his bearings. In just a few more blocks he'd be in the Devil's Watering Hole. A couple more blocks after that would land him on Mission Street.

  Sam tried to bury the nagging worry that all this was for nought – that his trek into the city would culminate at a dead end, with Helios Tavern shuttered and abandoned in the riots. Surely someone in the area knew who those men were...but then, what were the odds anyone was still around? The thought dragged at his weary steps almost as much as his growing hunger and pressing thirst. He licked his lips, already chapped and stinging from a full day without water. More likely than not, he was simply wasting his energy when he should have been trying to find some supplies.

  But Linda and Jeremy called to him as clearly as if they'd been standing in front of him, beckoning him forward. He couldn't find peace until he brought their killers to justice. They couldn't find peace. Sam let his fingers slide over the gold necklace and the baseball card in his pocket and tried to imagine a happy memory, but his mind would only conjure images of their bodies lying in the upstairs bedroom. He tried to picture their smiling faces, but saw only Jeremy's blank eyes staring toward the door, saw only Linda's lips still twisted in a silent scream hours after the life had drained out of her.

  Despair and rage quickened Sam's steps, and before he knew it he was standing on the corner of Mission Street and 7th. Aside from the steely glow of the full moon, the city was draped in darkness now, and Sam paused on the corner in a shadowed doorway and peered down the street. It didn't take long to find what he was looking for.

  Chapter 6

  Helios Tavern was a wide, square building that commanded its own lot, some of which was paved with parking spaces. The rest of the lot was a weedy, crumbled expanse of cracked asphalt littered with pallets and empty liquor boxes. Seven cars were sitting in the tavern's parking lot, and if not for their smashed-in windows, it would have looked like Helios was enjoying a booming night of business.

  The street was entirely empty at first, but as Sam watched and waited, a cluster of seven men turned a corner way down the street and began walking in Sam's direction. Each was carrying a hefty trash bag filled to bursting, and they laughed and smoked cigarettes as they walked, like they didn't have a care in the world. Sam pressed himself farther back into the dark doorway, but the men didn't come anywhere near him – they turned and walked in the front door of Helios Tavern.

  “Now that's interesting,” Sam whispered. He hadn't recognized any of the men, but from the looks of it, the tavern was operating as some kind of looter hub. And the way those guys had walked up the street, without a care in the world...Sam would have bet his rusty hatchet those trash bags were filled with food and supplies, and still nobody had tried to fuck with them. That meant they were important, or at least protected by someone important. And people around here knew it.

  Sam found that he wasn't surprised one bit. When the normal chain of authority was severed, somebody was always ready to step into the vacuum and take charge for themselves. He wasn't even shocked that it had happened so quickly. Clearly, this area had been under the thumb of a particularly powerful gang, and Sam had learned early, way back when he was a beat cop, that gangs operated with ruthless efficiency. Once the ceiling had broken apart, they'd already had the root system to sprout up like a weed, taking total control of the neighborhood. All they had to do was kill anyone who got in their way.

  Sam allowed himself a stony smile: he'd come to the right place.

  Three more men came out of the front door of the bar just then, arguing about something. Sam strained his ears to listen.

  “...ain't nothing up that way...”

  “...haven't hit Thurgood Street...”

  “...Jace and that new kid are doing Thurgood...”

  “...mean we gotta go all the way out to Briarcliffe again? God damn I'm tired a walkin'...”

  “Nah, not tonight, Skeez. We just breezin' up to the Lakes for a second look. Boss knows that asshole Jenkins always be leaving good stuff behind.”

  Sam felt a thrill of electricity shoot through him. Briarcliffe was a sprawling suburban zone somewhat close to his own house. If these guys were ranging out that far, it wasn't unreasonable to think that the gang that had hit his house had come from here, too. Sam let his fingers slide across the rough steel head of the hatchet. Jackpot.

  He slipped out of the doorway and backtracked the way he'd come, going two blocks down 7th before turning right. Nightfall had made it easy to stay hidden, and Sam felt a refreshing lightness in his step as he slipped through the shadows. He turned right again and now began to move more slowly, paying more attention to the debris-strewn streets ahead of him. His path had taken him in a wide semi-circle so that he could approach the Helios Tavern from the opposite direction, but that's not where he was going.

  When he was still a couple blocks away from Mission Street, Sam slipped behind a stinking green dumpster and waited. He'd been crouch
ing there for ten minutes, fighting not to let the fetid stench of rotting garbage get the best of his empty stomach, and was beginning to think he'd picked the wrong street when he finally heard the same three voices coming up the road. The men were ambling slowly up the center of the avenue, joking and bragging as they walked.

  All the time in the world, thought Sam bitterly.

  The three men passed by barely twenty feet away from Sam, and once they'd worked their way farther up the street he slipped out from behind the dumpster and began tailing them, sticking to the shadows.

  Back on Mission Street, where he'd first spotted them, one of them had mentioned going to the Lakes. His old partner's parents had lived at a retirement home about seven blocks from here called Shady Lakes. Sam had visited the place once. It had been easy enough to swing around and wait along the most likely route between Mission Street and the retirement home. Sure, he could have gone directly to Shady Lakes and waited, but he also didn't want to have to take on all three of them at once.

  No – he'd watched them pass a bottle around between themselves as they exited the tavern. Sam had seen enough winos locked up in the drunk tank to know that once the floodgates opened, they flowed often and regularly. Very soon, one of these guys would have to take a piss.

  As if on cue, barely a block from where Sam had started tailing them, one of the men slowed down and angled toward the curb.

  “Ay, keep up Skeez.”

  “Gotta take a leak,” the guy who'd fallen back called out. “I'll...” he belched, “...I'll be right there.”

  The other two grumbled, shrugged, and kept walking.

  Like they're following a script, Sam thought. People could be so easy to predict. He slipped through the shadows, doorway to doorway, watching his step so that he didn't accidentally step on a piece of glass or kick something and give his approach away.

  The man was using one hand to lean against a dark storefront, other hand at his fly, humming tunelessly as he relieved himself.

  Like a ghost, Sam came out of the darkness behind him, wrapped one arm around the guy's neck, and locked his wrist in the crook of his other elbow. He pressed hard against the man's throat to cut off his air supply and keep him from shouting, then tugged the man off his feet and dragged him into an alley directly beside them.

  It was all over in a second. Sam dropped the guy bodily to the hard ground and kneeled on his chest, pressing the knife attachment of the multitool against the man's throat.

  The guy sputtered and thrashed, but Sam pressed hard enough with the knife to draw a thin line of blood from the man's neck.

  “Try to shout and I'll cut out your vocal cords. Make a move and I'll put a slice in your carotid artery,” Sam hissed. “Either way, you'll bleed out like a pig. Now who are you?”

  “Who am I?” the man's eyes shot wide. “Who the hell are you? Oh man, you in for a world of hurt.”

  Sam kept the knife pressed to the man's throat and used his other hand to search the guy's pockets while he talked.

  “What does that tattoo mean? The one on your neck?”

  “You really don't know shit, do ya?” The man barked a short laugh, and Sam dug his knee into the guy's groin. “Jesus! Okay, you wanna die, that's on you. No secret anyway. Sundogs never forget. People around here are smart enough to know it.”

  “What are the sundogs?” Sam found a revolver wedged into the back of the man's belt. He used his thumb to release the cylinder, saw that it had six rounds, and knocked the cylinder back into place with a flick of his wrist. He thumbed the hammer back and pressed the barrel to the man's forehead, slipping the multitool back into his pocket.

  With each motion, the man talked a little faster.

  “This is the Sundogs, man.” He sort of thrust his neck toward Sam, indicating the sun-shaped tattoo on his neck, the same one Sam had seen on the killers at his house. “This is all the Sundogs. This whole hood. We own these streets.”

  “You operate out of the Helios Tavern?”

  “The hell, you some kind of cop? No, you ain't – even the cops follow orders 'round here. What's left of 'em, anyway.” He cackled, and a wave of liquor stench washed over Sam.

  Sam whipped the gun down and cracked the barrel against the man's forehead, drawing blood.

  “Tell me about Helios,” he hissed.

  “That's just one spot, man. Just one. You stupid? I told you. Sundogs are everywhere.”

  “Skags and Jackie,” Sam said. “Tell me about them.”

  The guy made a weird expression, somewhere between shock, horror, and glee.

  “They dead, man. Ha! Ricky told us all about it while he patched up. They offed some prepper jerk and his skank bit–” The man's head seemed to explode under Sam, accompanied by the roar of a gunshot. One moment it was there, the next it was splattered across the alley floor. Sam jerked away on reflex, then froze as a deep, calm voice said, “Drop the gun and stand up slowly.”

  He stood, turning around slowly, arms out. Two members of the National Guard had their assault rifles trained on his chest, fingers on the triggers.

  “I said drop it, buddy,” one of them barked.

  Sam let the revolver fall. It thumped onto the headless body beside him.

  “It's not what it looks like,” Sam said. “Listen, there are two more of them up the street. Probably on their way back. We don't have much time.”

  “What are you talking about?” the second Guardsman asked carefully.

  “This man is part of a criminal gang. They killed my family. I need your help. I know where their base of operations is.”

  “Oh yeah? Where's that?”

  “Helios Tavern. Over on Mission Street. Listen, I'm on your side. Ex-police. We need to work together.”

  The first Guardsman eyed the corpse on the ground with disdain.

  “Jeez, Skeez never did know when to shut up, did he?”

  Sam's eyes widened. No. It couldn't be.

  Around the corner, footsteps slapped on the concrete and the other two men appeared at the mouth of the alley.

  “What the hell is going on here, Thomas?” one of them demanded.

  The Guardsman turned to the newcomers. “Skeez was running his mouth, so I put a gag in it. Told this guy everything about you.”

  “Huh. So who the hell is this guy?” the same guy asked. He was burly, with shoulders the size of two hams and a thick blond beard.

  The Guardsman turned back to Sam, raising his rifle to his shoulder. The other two stepped forward and pulled handguns from their belts.

  “That's what we're about to find out,” the Guardsman said.

  Chapter 7

  Sam stared down the barrels of four loaded guns, wondering how he could have been stupid enough to get trapped like this. Behind him, the alley was narrow and straight, with nothing to use for cover. Even the darkness wouldn't help him here. If he tried to run and all four of them opened fire, he'd be cut to ribbons, whether they could see him or not.

  “Well, let's hear it buddy,” said Thomas, the Guardsman. “Who are you?”

  “How much are they paying you?” Sam asked.

  The Guardsman burst out laughing. “Why? You gonna double it, officer?” The last word came out as a sarcastic sneer, and the rest of them laughed too. All except the second Guardsman, Sam noticed. He was African-American, younger than the one who was clearly taking charge, and even though his mouth laughed, his eyes were nervous, darting back and forth between Sam and his cohorts.

  “Cop, huh?” the blond man said. “Is that what you are?”

  “I used to be,” said Sam.

  “Once a pig, always a pig,” the man sneered. “Well, we got a special treatment for you. But we'll get there. First, you talk. What did you want with Skeez?”

  “I won't tell you,” Sam said.

  “Well if this guy don't have a pair of jewels on him...” the blond man started saying.

  “...but I'll tell Ricky.” Sam finished, cutting him off.

 
“The hell you just say?”

  “I said I'll tell Ricky. Everything. What I'm doing here, where all my weapons are, and where my cache of food is,” Sam said. “But only Ricky.”

  It was a risky bluff, but Sam didn't see any way his situation could get any worse. And maybe, just maybe, he could still get a shot at his wife's killer.

  The other looter had been silent until that point. He was shorter than the other guy, and scrawnier. He suddenly spoke up: “What kind of food?”

  “Shut up, Tim,” snarled the blond man.

  “ A refrigerated locker,” Sam said quickly. “Underground, so it wasn't affected by the pulse. I've got a generator running. Cheese, meat, cold beer, ice. You name it. You're getting pretty tired of this canned stuff, aren't you Tim? How does a steak sound?”

  “Hey, you shut your mouth,” roared the blond man, stepping forward with his handgun out. “He's lyin', Tim. He don't have anything. Look at 'im. He can barely stand.”

  “That's why I want to talk to Ricky. I got waylaid, and I want protection. In exchange, your crew gets a refrigerated bunker. Electricity. Think about it.”

  At the word electricity, Tim licked his lips hungrily, like he was imagining a hot meal.

  “Well, what's that got to do with Ricky?” the blond guy asked. “Ricky ain't nobody.”

  “No, he ain't,” Sam said, lapsing into their rhythmic speech pattern. His arms were getting tired, but he had them talking, had them thinking. Had them not shooting. That was the important part. “But I know Ricky. He can vouch for me.”

  The men seemed to consider this. They looked at each other, and Tim whispered something to the big blonde-haired guy. Sam's heart raised a few inches from the pit of his stomach, where it'd been resting for this whole exchange. They might believe him. The blond man nodded at Tim, then turned back to Sam.

  “Alright, we'll get you–”

  “What's he look like?” Thomas cut in, steely eyes drilling into Sam's.

  “Huh?” Sam was legitimately confused.

  “Ricky,” Thomas said. “What's he look like?”