The Dark Days
Dorian Lennox
Episode 2
by
Ginger Gelsheimer and Taylor Anderson
© 2014 Ginger Gelsheimer and Taylor Anderson
Published by GK Publishing
All Rights Reserved
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Table of Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
From the Authors
Chapter 1
With a jolt, I wake from one of those horrible dreams—the kind where you’re falling and if you don’t wake up before you hit the ground, you’ll die. It wasn’t all just a bad dream. I’m still sitting on the rooftop of a rental car office in the middle of the ocean in Colorado.
The morning is bright and sunny, surreal against the total annihilation surrounding us, but I’m happy to see it. The good news is that the water level has gone down a bit overnight, and based on the car tops protruding from the water, it’s only a few feet deep. I can see the airport now, or what is left of it, after crashing planes and a typhoon brought a wrath of destruction.
Ben is still asleep. It’s the first time he looks like a thirteen-year old since I met him on our flight from Florida. He’s smart way beyond his years and it shines through his eyes.
Masaru is over in the center of the roof island doing yoga or meditating—both I think. He looks odd wearing his leather and fur boots, but I don’t blame him, it’s freezing.
Elsie is nearby—her pet pigeon Bernie rides on her shoulder. She looks up to see if anyone is watching before sifting through her glass bottles. Curiosity is killing me over what all that stuff is for. I know I saw darts.
I do a quick scan. Where’s Edgar? He’s not on the roof.
“Where’s Edgar,” I ask, this time out loud.
Elsie hears me and points down the road with a long, skinny object in her hand. Is that a wand? Time to find out who Elsie really is.
I try to spot Edgar in the mess on Pena Boulevard littered with flooded cars. Some are upside down or on their sides. Others are stacked two and three high. Trash and debris float atop the rippling water and a foul stench of salt water, gasoline and oil, and fish burn my nose.
Edgar has returned to his truck, which is now a quarter-mile down the road. It’s parked on top of what I think is a Corvette. I see him and wave, but he’s focused on his task and doesn’t see me.
Surveying my surroundings, I cringe when I notice how many dead bodies stare out at me from inside the flooded cars. Hundreds of cars are scattered across the old highway. Every one of them had a driver.
Some people got out of their cars. Their bodies float by now and then with cold, empty eyes. I’m pretty sure I saw the lady that threw her cell phone at me when we were making our grand escape. I recognized her by her red scarf.
Ben begins to stir. I’m glad he’s waking up. I need a distraction.
He’s groggy and wipes his eyes. “Good morning.”
“Morning,” I reply.
The remains of the fire are nothing more than smoldering coals and we’re out of stuff to burn without getting off the roof. I stare into the water with complete dread. I’m going to have to come down eventually whether the water recedes or not—probably sooner than later because we don’t have much food. Most of it blew up with Lena.
I need to stop thinking about dead people. “Sure wish I had some coffee.” I divert my thoughts to one of my favorite things. For a second, I can actually smell it brewing.
“I’ve never had it,” Ben says sitting up. I hadn’t tried it yet either at his age.
“Well then, you shall when we get out of this. It makes you actually look forward to the morning.” I am a late sleeper—not one of my classes is scheduled before noon. Guess I won’t be taking my psychology test this week, or ever.
“Yes, when we get out of this,” Ben repeats what I’ve said. It’s like a mantra we need to keep saying. Otherwise, why keep going?
“The water’s gone down,” he says as Elsie approaches. He pulls a rolled up bag of tortilla chips out of his pack. “This is all we have left. The women should have it.” He smiles and gives the bag of chips to Elsie.
“Thank you, Ben.” She bites into a stale chip. I can tell because it doesn’t crunch the way it should.
Just then, Edgar paddles up in a red kayak. He pulls an unopened bag of tortilla chips out of the water. Blood splatter covers the outside of the plastic. Beggars can’t be choosers.
Ben’s so excited about the kayak, I think he’s about to jump off the roof to check it out. “Where’d you get that?”
Edgar paddles in slowly. “It was floating near my truck. Lucky for us, these were still inside,” he says, holding up the paddles.
“We can definitely use a boat,” I say. At this point, I think the water may never go down.
“What else you got?” Elsie points with her bony index finger at a bundle on the floor of the kayak tucked between Edgar’s feet.
He holds up a jumbo bag of beef jerky and some trail mix. “This ought to carry us over for a couple of days.”
I’m not thrilled at the thought of being up here for a couple of days, but I am relieved to see the food.
Elsie gives me the tortillas and opens her hands up to Edgar like she’s ready to catch a baseball. He tosses the jerky up to her. She pulls out a big piece and chaws down on it, ripping a piece off with her teeth before handing me the bag.
“Looks like we can get another fire going.” Ben motions toward a pile of broken boards and other stuff that looks good to burn.
Perfect, because I’m not getting into that water unless it’s my absolute last resort.
Edgar’s smile grows wider than I’ve ever seen it. He has a gold crown in his top right jaw. It’s the first time I’ve noticed it. We haven’t had too many reasons to smile over the past twenty-four hours, especially big like that.
Edgar peeks under an old army blanket. It conceals something that has caused him to go giddy. He looks up at Elsie.
“Well, go on,” she says. “You’ve got us all chummed up now.”
He pulls the blanket off like a magician exposing his magic box, where the lady miraculously isn’t cut into three pieces. “For you Elsie, to hold your things.”
Awwww, he’s a big teddy bear…with a rifle and an ax.
“Thank you,” Elsie’s voice cracks, and she has to swallow before she can finish, “Edgar.” She’s taken back by his ac
t of kindness.
“You’re welcome, Elsie. Sorry, we had to sacrifice the other one.”
I glance over at the smoldering ash, part of which used to be her intricately-carved trunk.
“It’s okay, I understand…and it kept my old bones warm, too.” I’m glad she forgives us because I like her. I also have a strange feeling I don’t want her angry with me.
“I’ll help you with that,” Ben offers, jumping from the roof to the top of the shuttle. Edgar paddles over to it, still parked where it was before the flood, which is amazing in itself.
“We should pull it up here,” Ben suggests.
“I think you’re right.” Edgar hops out of the kayak, wearing thigh-high, wading boots. He lifts the metal box up to Ben, who tosses it over to Elsie. She scurries off to put her things inside.
Ben takes the two paddles from Edgar and sets them aside. He grabs the bundle of wood and tosses a few pieces at a time to the roof.
I reach down to take an army blanket from Edgar. I don’t care if it’s itchy, it’s warm.
Lifting the kayak out of the water, Edgar holds the front end up to Ben. “You got it, Son?”
“Yep.” Ben gets a firm grip on the kayak. “I got it. Push it on up.”
With a little help from Edgar, he pulls the kayak up onto the top of the van. With a little help from Ben, Edgar climbs up.
The sun is burning hot on my face as the temperature warmed up quite a bit from yesterday. Colorado is like that. One day you get a foot of snow, and the next day it’s seventy degrees. It’s one of my favorite things about the place. That and how fast storms come over the mountains.
I stack the wood near the old ashes and return to gather the rest of the stuff Ben tossed over. He leaps across from the van, landing light on his feet like a grasshopper.
Thud! Edgar’s approach is not so graceful, but at least he makes it.
I reach down and give him a hand to help him up.
“Thank you, ma’am.” He is gracious, but did he have to call me ma’am? I’m too young to be a ma’am.
Edgar removes the rubber boots, and I realize that his pants are wet from wading to his car before he retrieved the boots. “We have to get you dry, Edgar.”
“Don’t you let him catch cold,” Elsie shouts from across the way. She places a small green vial into the box.
I throw a few boards into the hot ashes and blow, trying to ignite them.
The end of a blow torch appears over my shoulder from behind. I look up and Ben displays a Cheshire grin. “It’s easier this way.” We make a good team.
Returning from his meditation, Masaru joins us by the fire. He must have enlightened himself for two hours. His face is covered with concern and he shakes his head side to side. “Things are not good.”
Chapter 2
The water has only receded maybe another six inches throughout the day. The sun is setting, and the temperature has already dropped.
“Should we stay up here another night, make our way west to Denver…head back to the airport?” I ask the group.
“I don’t know, but the water was deeper out toward my truck,” Edgar interjects.
I remember that from geography or some class I had in high school. The airport is actually higher in altitude than the actual city of Denver by over a hundred feet.
Masaru shakes his head. “Not the airport.”
The vision of Lena’s horrible death races through my head. “Not the airport,” I agree.
Ben sits down and dangles his legs over the edge of the roof. “That settles it then.”
I’m not thrilled about spending another night on a rooftop outside in the cold, but it is the lesser of the evils—at least for now. I sit next to Ben and swing my legs over the side.
Wrapping the army blanket around our backs, I observe his emotional state. He seems fine, but he is still a kid, even though I don’t call him that. And what we’ve seen would disturb anyone. “You doing okay?”
“Yeah, how about you?” he asks, his eyes are concerned, looking to me for an honest answer. Had he heard me cry last night?
“Still in a bit of shock, I think.” I gaze across the water to the west. At least the mountains are still there…and hopefully the people that live up in them.
He takes my hand and squeezes it tight. “Me, too.”
We sit in silence for a few minutes watching things float by. Aluminum cans, trash, water bottles…a plastic dinosaur toy. I tell myself the child is home safe, and the toy was just in the car. Survival is a mental game now.
“They’re gone, aren’t they?” He doesn’t have to say who they are.
Nodding my head, I return the squeeze to his hand. “Probably.”
“We’re family now,” he says. No tears, just a solid statement of what is.
The sunset behind the mountains is stunning, so bright it looks like someone colored the sky with crayons. Seems with everything that has happened, it should just be grey.
For another hour, we stare at the mountains, and by now, Masaru, Elsie and Edgar have joined us. No one speaks. We’re all trying to figure out a plan. West—that’s where we need to go. Unfortunately, the kayak will only fit three of us—two with supplies.
I can hear teeth chattering with nightfall setting in, but we need to hold off as long as possible before we build another fire since we had to burn some of the wood earlier in the day to dry Edgar out. Without him, we wouldn’t have any wood at all, so it was the least we could do. He would have suffered from hypothermia from his wet clothes for sure.
The night air is silent, icy and mysterious. The moon, with its new black spot, will forever be a constant reminder of the Death Asteroid.
I doze off sitting up. That’s one thing I love about myself—I can sleep standing up. My slumber is interrupted by a hard jolt and a rumbling vibration. I’m disoriented at first and have to look around to get my bearings.
“Was that thunder?” I’m still a little hazy.
“Not thunder,” Masaru says. He’s been unusually quiet since he meditated.
Ben is pondering, I can tell by the look in his eyes.
I think we all know what it is. The Earth isn’t done settling.
***
I sleep amazingly well and the next morning, I’m glad to see the water has gone down some more. Now, we can make it to the airport by hopping from dry patch to dry patch in between the lakes and puddles. Even though it isn’t our first choice, it’s currently our only choice. It’s still flooded to the west.
We pack the kayak with the supplies we have left and Elsie’s trunk. There’s enough room for her to ride on the front, so Edgar offers to push her along by walking through an area that is still flooded alongside Pena Boulevard. The rest of us make our way through the dry spots. Thankfully, the sun is out again.
When we first reach the airport grounds, it looks like a hurricane came through and spun everything around. Planes are scattered everywhere; there’s even one protruding out of the famous DIA snow peaks. Over to the left, a baggage cart and a few cars hang over the edge of the parking garage. Suitcases are strewn all over the place.
Edgar pulls the kayak onto a dry area. He lifts Elsie out with one arm—she weighs nothing and he’s strong as an ox. He sets her down on the ground, and Bernie never moves from Elsie’s shoulder. Her arms are wrapped tightly around her precious trunk. If someone wants that thing, they’re going to have to pry it from her cold, dead fingers.
Ben darts toward a puddle jumper with its door open and the stairs extended. Maybe those people got out alive. Then what? I scan the devastation surrounding me. Ben disappears into the plane, and Masaru, Edgar, Elsie and I search around the grounds for anything that might be useful. The place is a ghost town. It doesn’t look or sound as though there are any survivors.
I find a large tarp and a roll of twine and carry them over to the kayak. Masaru meets me there with a can of gasoline he’s found.
With her trunk tucked under one arm, Elsie scrambles throug
h suitcases like a squirrel digging for nuts. She holds up an old style magnifying glass with a lens as big as her face. Her eyes are enormous and the distortion makes her look like a cartoon.
Ben returns to the doorway of the puddle hopper with several items bulging out of the front of his shirt. He holds the sides of his shirt up together to make a cradle so he can carry everything. I see a gold compass that could easily be a hundred years old and another pair of binoculars, only black this time. Then, he holds something up and waves it back and forth, making sure to get my attention. “Claudia! I got your coffee!”
That’s when the five guns are pointed at our heads.
Chapter 3
Dorian Lennox is his name—the man I saw speaking into the walkie-talkie at the airport when we first landed. He steps up from behind the wall of gunmen and takes a good look at the five of us: a short, old lady hugging a box; a thirteen-year old boy with freckles and glasses; a lumberjack; an old Japanese guy wearing leather and fur boots; and me, a nineteen-year old girl with a ponytail and a college sweatshirt.
“Lower your weapons,” he says to his men and they obey. “Didn’t mean to scare you…just with everything that’s happened.”
So because we’ve had a disaster strike the Earth, we now point guns at innocent survivors?
“I’m Dorian Lennox, head of security for DIA.”
“So all this is your fault then?” Ben teases Dorian.
This kid is a riot! I can’t believe he just had the nerve to poke fun at the guy that controls the weapons.
Dorian chuckles…barely, and he isn’t smiling. “Follow me, I’ll take you to the shelter where the rest of the survivors are.”
He peers behind Edgar into the kayak, scanning the treasures we’ve collected. “I’m going to need that rifle and ax. No one is allowed to have weapons inside the shelter.”
No one but you. Who died and put this guy in charge of the world?
The Dark Days: Dorian Lennox - Episode 2 Page 1