by Tom Abrahams
“I’ll survive,” said Steve. “We Canadians have a lot of pluck.”
“The bodies are over there,” Clayton said. He motioned toward the front side of the staircase. “I hid them.”
Steve started toward the temporary mausoleum. He carried the pistol axe with confidence and marched past Clayton, picking up and planting his boots in the icy snow. The wind changed directions and blew the top layers of snow into spinning funnels.
Clayton pulled his hood lower on his head and tucked his chin into the fully zipped collar. He followed Steve back to the fence-like boards he’d damaged and haphazardly replaced. Steve pulled away one of the boards and ducked under the stairs, disappearing into the black.
Clayton limped to the opening and pulled himself into the space. He clicked his flashlight and shone the light onto the bodies. Steve looked at Clayton with both fear and sympathy.
“They’re horrible,” said Steve. His voice was much easier to hear with the stairs blocking most of the wind. “I mean, it’s horrible. They…it’s…I’ve never seen a dead body.”
Clayton couldn’t say the same. A nightmarish image of his twin sister’s body flashed in his mind. He blinked it away and took another step closer to Steve. “I’m sorry you have to do this,” he said. “You didn’t know what you were getting into when you offered your help.”
Steve shrugged. “What do we do? Drag them, I guess?”
“That’s what I’ve been doing.”
Steve motioned his head toward the glacier. “All the way from there? You dragged them off the glacier?”
Clayton nodded and grabbed one of the bungee cords. He showed Steve what he’d fashioned for the haul and started dragging Ben’s body into the open. Steve took the cord attached to Boris’s Soyuz chair and followed Clayton’s lead. Instead of pulling the chair backward, as Clayton was doing, Steve pulled the chair with the cord over his shoulder.
A blast of wind hit Clayton’s back the moment he emerged from the hiding spot. All he could hear was the whip and howl of a sustained gust that had to be forty miles per hour. Clayton, favoring his injured leg, lost his balance as he tried to stand. He fell onto his back, the bungee still wrapped around his hand. His body sank into the snow.
He glanced up at the milky pink sky for an instant, content to rest his leg for a moment and avoid the wind. His hood blocked one eye, the fur tickling his lashes. He picked up his head, looking back toward the stairs and finding Steve standing outside the opening. The Canadian had dropped the bungee and was waving his hands. He was saying something, but Clayton couldn’t hear it above the sharp whistle of the wind.
Clayton fumbled with the snow at either side of his body until he gripped the flashlight. Its beam was buried in the snow until he pulled it free and aimed it at Steve’s face. Steve winced at the light and averted his eyes, but Clayton could see something was wrong. The veins in Steve’s neck bulged and strained as he yelled.
“You—hind—you—ton—hind!”
Clayton struggled to understand the urgency. He mouthed the words as he saw them. They didn’t make sense.
“—oove—be—don’t—still!”
Clayton pushed himself into a seated position and saw Steve was looking past him, toward the glacier. Steve raised the TP-82 with one shaky hand. Clayton spun around, the beam of light tracking with him.
He saw the eyes first, reflecting the LED light. They glowed with primal intent. No more than ten feet from him, crouched aggressively and seemingly ready to pounce, was a trio of snarling, drooling wolves. No sooner had he locked eyes with one of them when it leapt forward, covering the distance in a remarkably impossible second. The wolf caught Clayton’s coat, tearing it away from his right arm and spinning Clayton back into the snow.
He felt it whipping its head, tearing away the fabric until it found flesh. Clayton twisted and swung wildly with the flashlight, connecting its base with the side of the wolf’s face. It yelped and retreated for an instant, then shook off the hit and lunged forward again. With the bungee still wrapped around one hand, Clayton pulled the cord taut. The cord caught the animal at its neck, above its shoulders, and Clayton rolled away from the beast, wrapping the cord over its head. The wolf fought, struggling to free itself, its jaws snapping and its head shaking wildly.
Clayton tightened his grip on the cord, dropping the flashlight and using both hands to stretch the elasticity of the cord. It was tangled around the wolf’s neck, snout, and one of its forelegs. As it struggled, its back claws found Clayton’s leg wound and dragged across it, ripping open the sutures. He screamed in pain, his cry muffled by the wind. It strengthened his resolve as a burning wave of instinctive anger coursed through his body. He pulled tighter on the cord. The animal gagged and choked. It coughed against the tightening bungee and swung its head from side to side. Clayton heard a series of loud pops die in the wind as he rolled away from the weakening attack from the wolf. He gave the cord one last long pull and felt the animal kick. It jerked violently and gagged, a choked whimper leaked from its mouth, and it stopped moving.
Clayton rolled over, unwrapped the cord from his bruised hands, and dragged himself free from the wolf. It wasn’t until he was able to focus that he saw the animal was bloodied.
Steve was standing above him, the Russian pistol axe smoking in his hand. He’d put three bullets in the wolf and scared away the other two. He reached out and offered Clayton his hand.
“I’d have shot him sooner,” he said, “but you kept rolling every which way. I was afraid I was going to hit you.”
Clayton thanked Steve and used his shoulder to gain his balance as he tried to stand upright. A laser bolt of pain shot from his foot up into his groin when he tried putting weight on his injured leg.
Steve put his arm around Clayton’s waist and looked down. His eyes widened. “You’re bleeding! Did I hit you? Are you shot?”
Clayton shook his head and winced. “No, the wolf got me. I think it ripped the stitches with its hind foot. Caught them with its claws.”
“I was trying to warn you,” said Steve. “But this damn wind. It’s too much.”
“We gotta get Boris and Ben to the truck,” Clayton said. “I can make it the short distance if you hand me the cord.”
“Don’t you wanna rest a second?” asked Steve. “I can get the bodies. One at a time, I’ll pull them over.”
Clayton waved him off. “No. Thank you. I can do it. I got them this far. I can help get them to the truck.”
Steve reluctantly let go of Clayton and then handed him the bungee attached to Ben’s chair. One laborious step at a time, Clayton inched his way to the truck. Steve helped him load both bodies into the bed and the two of them climbed into the truck. They rode silently for a half hour while Clayton worked on his wound, awkwardly re-stitching the hole in his leg. When he was finished, he lay back on the headrest and closed his eyes. He held his hands at the heater vents, flexing his fingers and absorbing the warmth into his stiff joints.
“Steve,” he said, his voice hoarse from having yelled against the wind, “I can’t thank you enough. You’re a real hero.”
Steve’s eyes stayed on the road ahead. He was leaning into the wheel, both of his hands gripping it tightly. “I’m a hero?” He laughed. “Yeah, right. I’m a regular fella with a truck that works, a decent HAM radio, and a cool new pistol axe. You’re the hero.”
“Hero?” Clayton asked. “Yeah, right. I’m a guy who fell from the sky.”
CHAPTER 23
MONDAY, JANUARY 27, 2020, 5:18 AM CST
CLEAR LAKE, TEXAS
Justin awoke with Wanda’s leg draped over his. He was on his back and her hand was under his shirt, flat on his bare chest, her fingers tangled in the tufts of hair that curled between his defined pecs.
It was cold in the house and he pulled the thin sheet up over their bodies and closed his heavy eyes. He could taste his stale breath in his mouth as he tried to work himself back to sleep. He’d been dreaming of something good, but
he couldn’t quite remember what it was. All he knew was that he hadn’t slept long enough.
As he dug himself deeper under the sheet and more closely against Wanda’s warm body, the previous night’s events flooded back into his mind and clouded any chance of recalling the dream. He was stuck here now. He was awake.
Justin blinked open his eyes and wiped away the crusty sleep in their corners. Wanda pressed her hips against him. She purred.
He ran his hand along her bare thigh, his fingers drifting closer to the thin lace covering parts of her body. As he neared the target area, her hand slid from his chest and gently thwarted his advance.
“I’m tired,” she cooed. “Go back to sleep.”
Justin pushed her leg from atop his body and rolled away from her. She protested, trying to pull him closer, but he draped his arm off the mattress and onto the floor. He traced doodles into the thin film of dust and began making plans.
They’d been lucky so far. Despite his lack of skill, Justin had managed a good haul of food, medicine, and supplies. They’d taken enough from the old woman to last the gang a couple of weeks. Added to what he’d taken from the woman he’d killed and what they already had in the house, he guessed there was enough for close to a month. It was a good start. This apocalypse, or whatever it was, was a Godsend for Justin Watson.
He’d never had much. His earliest memories were with a single mother and an absent father. The truth was, he’d never met the man. His mother either hadn’t known his name or wouldn’t reveal it to her son. Then she’d gone to prison and Justin had bounced from foster home to foster home until nobody would have him. He’d been labeled hostile and aggressive. So he’d couch-surfed staying days or weeks at a time in the homes of friends at school. He’d stayed in school for the free meals. When Wanda had gotten pregnant, he’d dropped out and gotten a job. He didn’t really love the girl. She was overbearing and emasculating. But he’d been determined not to disappear, as his father had.
With his growing family, his gang, and jobs at a cell phone store and as an overnight grocery stocker, he’d been on the right track. Then he got caught stealing diapers from the store, and the cell phone store went corporate. He was out of work and angry. Odd jobs hadn’t provided much in the weeks leading up to the apocalypse. They were late on rent and had bills than they could pay. Then the lights went out and he’d seen an opportunity. The quicker he took advantage, the better off he’d be.
He’d overestimated his abilities, however, and twice made things more difficult than they’d needed to be. Tonight would be different. He and his boys would raid the empty house the people in the Jeep left behind. They could even set up shop and use it as a base of operations as they systematically pilfered from every home in the neighborhood. One at a time, they could scout the next target. They could be smart about it and not put themselves at risk.
Wanda’s hand snaked inside his shirt and she raked her fingernails up his back. It sent a shudder up Justin’s spine.
“What are you thinking about?” she asked, the sleep thick in her voice. “How good you did last night?”
“I’m thinking about the next hit,” he said without rolling over to face her. “It could be a good one.”
“Same neighborhood I told you about?”
Justin clenched his jaw. He curled his fingers into a claw on the floor. He grumbled an unintelligible response.
“What?”
“I said yes.”
She swirled her fingers in a circle on his back. “I knew it would be good. Those people have more than they need. They’re rich. They got big houses with too many rooms. I bet a lot of them have nice jewelry too.”
Justin pulled away from her touch and rolled over to face her. “Jewelry?”
Her eyebrows knitted, and she sneered. “Jeww-ell-ree. Rings. Watches. Necklaces. Earrings.”
“I know what jewelry is,” Justin said. “I don’t get your point. We need things that matter: food, water, clothing, guns, knives.”
She rolled her eyes. “Oh, like you can’t find a nice little something for the mother of your child? Seriously? You have the time to go back to a woman’s house and kill her because she disrespected you, but you can’t—”
“Enough!” he snapped and pushed her away. He ripped the sheet from his body and slid onto the floor.
“Don’t you touch me, Justin,” she said. “You don’t touch me like that.”
Justin ignored her. He pulled on his jeans, snapped them at the waist, and pulled on a University of Houston sweatshirt. She was still chastising him when he stomped from the bedroom and down the hall. The baby started crying and Justin, for a split second, considered turning around to comfort his child. He didn’t. He kept marching to the kitchen. Palero was there, eating a bowl of dry cereal.
“She at you again?” Palero asked through a mouthful of Cap’n Crunch.
Justin opened the room-temperature refrigerator and yanked a beer from the door. He popped the tab and sipped the foamy spillage from the edge of the drink. It was warm and bitter, but he downed half the can then set it on the counter with a carbonated belch. He wiped his mouth with the sweatshirt sleeve and licked the front of his teeth.
“She wants jewelry,” he said.
“Why? We need other stuff. Not gold and diamonds.”
Justin took another pull of the beer, finishing it. He crunched the can in his hand and angrily tossed it to the floor.
“That’s what I said,” Justin explained and picked another beer from the fridge. “She didn’t want to hear it. Told me I could get what we need and what she wants.”
Palero set down his bowl. “We hitting that empty house tonight? The one at the end of the dead end street with the big houses?”
Justin nodded, gulping down the second can. He emptied it, squeezed it, and tossed it onto the floor next to the other can. His head suddenly felt light, his fingers tingled, and his building rage dissipated.
“What do we do until then?” asked Palero. “We got, like, twelve hours until the sun goes down.”
“We chill,” said Justin. He reached into the icebox for a third warm beer and tossed it to Palero, who fumbled it against his chest. “Drink up.”
Palero pursed his lips. “It’s, like, six o’clock in the morning, J.”
Justin squeezed his face into a disapproving scowl. “And?”
“I’m just—”
“Don’t judge,” Justin sneered. “I got enough of that. Drink the beer.”
Palero swallowed hard and tapped the top of the can with his finger. He popped it open and brought it to his lips, taking a short sip.
Justin took a giant step toward Palero and glowered. He put his fingers on the bottom edge of the can and tipped it toward Palero’s mouth. “Drink the beer.”
CHAPTER 24
MONDAY, JANUARY 27, 2020, 8:01 AM CST
CLEAR LAKE, TEXAS
Jackie answered the knock at the door. She wondered if she looked as tired as the couple standing on her front porch. Pop Vickers had deep, swollen circles under his eyes. His wife Nancy wore a frown deeply burrowed into her cheeks. It framed her chin as would a Fu Manchu mustache. Both of them carried bags on their shoulders, and there were three large suitcases at their feet.
Pop’s brows arched to a point. “Is it too early?”
All sense of time had evaporated. Jackie was perpetually tired and got only snippets of sleep through the night. She’d awoken twenty minutes earlier and taken over watch from Nikki, who had boarded up the windows with pieces of plywood and plastic bin covers she’d found in the garage.
She smiled at her neighbors. “Of course not,” she said, glancing at their belongings. “Are you leaving?”
The Vickers exchanged looks. “We were robbed last night,” said Pop. “We don’t feel safe in our home anymore.”
“I’m so sorry,” Jackie said. “What can I do to help?”
Pop bit his lip. “Could we stay with you?” He machine-gunned a list of reasons why they w
ouldn’t be any trouble to her. She could help them.
Jackie waved him off and tried to assure him it was fine. “You’ve always been good to us,” she said and stepped onto the porch to get one of the suitcases. “You’re welcome to stay as long as you need.”
Pop and Nancy exhaled, blowing out relief. They moved into the house, thanking Jackie profusely.
“Have you heard from Clayton?” Pop asked, unzipping his jacket.
Jackie shook her head and placed the suitcase on the floor next to the rest of the Vickers’s’ belongings. “Not yet. We know that a Soyuz left the ISS and somebody was on board. That’s about all.”
“I’m sorry to hear that,” said Pop. “I’ve lost my communication with the outside world or I’d try to help.”
“They took all of his radios,” said Nancy. “Batteries, flashlights, and most of our food.”
Pop waved his hand over the bags on the floor. “We do have some food, some paper products, coffee, and other stuff that might contribute a little. It’s not much. Also, I’ve got a couple of weapons with me. Shotgun is unloaded and in that large duffel. Hope that’s okay.”
Jackie motioned to the kitchen and led the couple toward the island. “It’s fine,” she said. “What happened exactly? Were you home when they broke in?”
Pop and Nancy took seats on the island barstools. Pop sank onto the chair. The quartet of parallel lines that ran across his broad forehead appeared more deeply etched than Jackie remembered them. His eyelids were heavier. His hands were more spotted, his skin paper thin and riddled with age spots. His Marine Corps tattoo was faded to gray. He’d always seemed much younger than his age, but looking at him now, Jackie thought him brittle.
“We were home,” said Pop. “They had somebody at the front door and somebody at the back.”
“We hid in the closet upstairs,” said Nancy. “There were at least two of them in the house. Probably more.”
“Any idea who they were?”