The World Burns: A Post-Apocalyptic Story

by Boyd Craven III

  “Yours is dead too.”

  “It can’t be. It was on the charger during dinner,” he muttered, taking his eyes off the road a second to look at it.

  “Look out!” She threw her hands up to protect her face and Blake slammed on the breaks, skidding forward.

  They were truly blessed that Blake missed the stump. He took a couple of deep breaths to clear his head before reversing the truck and putting it back on the path he’d almost left.

  “The radio isn’t working,” he muttered after fiddling with it.

  “Oh shit, I hope I’m wrong.”

  “What?”

  “Blake, something bad has happened. I hope I’m wrong.”

  “What?”

  “Let’s get to town.”

  “No, what? What do you think?”

  “Your truck is running, right?”

  “Yeah.” He was a little confused by her question.

  “But you have a newer radio, and both of our phones are dead.”

  “So, what’s that mean?”

  “Blake, this is tinfoil hat time, OK? You with me, Blake?”

  “Okay, sure.”

  “In the army, there was a study done on the effect of EMPs.”

  “I know what an EMP is; you think we got hit with one?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t have enough information yet, but…”

  Blake had finally driven to the end of the lane and to the edge of the divided highway where the trees parted to show the roadway. There weren’t any cars nearby, but off in the distance, they could see people stopped and walking in the road.

  “Oh God, this isn’t good. We have to check on my father.”

  “We will,” he downshifted and took off, weaving through the stalled traffic when he came to it. People were standing by their dead cars.

  For a moment, they both looked at each other. Then they felt the earth shaking. Blake slammed on the breaks as a large cloud of smoke mushroomed up a mile ahead of them. Flames flickered at the edges of Blake’s vision, and a wave of heat hit them.

  “We have to turn around.”

  “It’s the wrong way,” Blake said, not thinking.

  “Do it, hurry!”

  His driving instructor from years ago wouldn’t have approved of the turn he made, and soon they both were sweating as the heat continued to build within the cab. The fires had started to consume everything on the south side of the highway, with the median starting to smolder. Blake swore softly under his breath and pushed the pedal down harder, the stranded cars and people becoming blurs. He slowed finally when they reached Holloway Lane. They were almost going as fast as they came down it, the suspension groaning as the truck bounced all over the track.

  “Do you think the fire will reach all the way up here?”

  “I don’t know. It was moving awfully fast. I don’t know what set it off, but I bet you it’s from what we felt when the ground shook.”

  “It felt like a big bomb went off.”

  “You know, if we go to the back of my property, on top of the hill, there’s an old grain silo. When I was a kid, I could see the entire valley from up there.”

  “I’m worried about my dad,” Sandra admitted.

  “I know. Right now, we have to make sure we’re safe and the fire hasn’t spread.”

  “What if it has?”

  “I wait for the wind to shift and start a backfire. I’m hoping the wide median across the highway will work as a firebreak. I’ve never set one before.”

  “Me neither. I was mainly a door gunner and mechanic,” her voice was coming out strained from the tension.

  After long minutes, they made it to the top of the hill, but Blake didn’t stop. He kept driving past the barn, leaving the mowed path. He stayed about ten feet away from the fence line, his pickup slipping in the tall grass as the pitch of the hill increased. Finally, he stopped next to an old stone structure, the roof fallen in long ago.

  “Hurry,” Sandra’s voice was cracked with worry.

  They both scurried up the rusty steel rungs until they reached the top. Sandra was transfixed with the hollow yawning hole of the silo, the perfect blackness below the edge. Blake was sitting with one leg over each side of the edge of the silo, his mouth gaping wide open.

  “Sandra, look.” His voice was almost a moan.

  What she saw shocked her. There were two clear lines of destruction to the city below, and fire spreading from there on out.

  “Oh dear God,” she murmured. “That looks like a crashed jet.”

  “God no, that can’t be right.”

  “That looks like the same line of wreckage that happened in the Pentagon on 9/11. It was something we had to study in our emergency response training. Oh God, Dad, the church,” she sobbed.

  Blake took in her tearstained cheeks and wanted to hold her, to comfort her, but the weight of his realization had him dumbfounded. He watched the fire march up to the highway, consuming everything in its path. They were too far away to make out cars or people, but he prayed that all living folks had fled. His breath caught when part of the median caught fire, but its path stopped as it hit the water of the drainage running down the center. They sat like that for hours, waiting and watching until the air became unbearable. The smoke was getting too thick, so they made their way to the ground, which was only slightly better.

  “Do you think my dad is okay?”

  “I hope so,” he told her truthfully.

  They crawled down slowly and got in the truck, driving the rest of the way to the house. Both of them were too exhausted, and Blake asked if Sandra wanted the mattress or the bedroom or the living room. She sat down on the floor next to where Blake was standing. Confused, he sat down next to her and she wrapped her arms around him, squeezing. They fell into an exhausted sleep like that, and awoke in the morning with stiff and sore muscles.

  Chapter 5 -

  They both stretched and used the restroom. Blake went throughout the house checking on things, and to his surprise, all the electrical stuff in the house except for his cell phone and laptop, which had been upstairs, didn’t work. Sandra noticed that right away and raised an eyebrow before asking, “How is it the lights are working?”

  “Let’s go check the basement.”

  They headed down, and he showed her his room he kept the batteries and charge controller in, how it was insulated with foil-backed material to ward off the damp and moisture.

  “Wow, it must have shielded everything down here. Your well is underground too, isn’t it?”

  “Yeah. It was a pain but—”

  “Do you think we can go outside and look?”

  “We probably should.”

  They headed outside where the smell of smoke was more noticeable. Neither of them could see any fire coming up towards Blake’s house. They both looked at the truck, then looked at each other.

  “Maybe we should drive down and check,” Blake said after a moment.

  “Sure,” Sandra told him, but he could tell that her soul was heavy with worry.

  The old truck started up and ran as well as it had the day before, and soon they were at the end of the lane. Blake shut off the engine and hopped out. The fire had consumed everything across the divided highway, and parts of the tall grass in the median had burned all the way down to the soil. Ash covered everything like white powdery snow, and when the wind picked up, the heat was still almost unbearable.

  “It looks like it’s out over here.” He looked to see if Sandra had heard him.

  “Do you think it’s safe? To go into town?”

  “We can try.”

  Both of them were scared of what they’d find, but with the worst of the danger gone, information and finding Pastor Duncan became their top priority. They drove for about five minutes when it became obvious that they couldn’t go any further. Waves of heat washed over them as they drove closer to the site of impact, and when the wind blew, ashes would swirl, obscuring the views. Thick columns of smoke rose into the distanc
e, and it looked as if the gates of hell had opened, consuming everything in its path.

  “I don’t think I can keep going. The fires are still burning, and its—” He stopped when a loud sob interrupted him.

  “My dad. I hope…Blake, my dad was going to head to the late show to see the new Terminator movie. Do you know what time everything went out?”

  “It felt like we had an hour of daylight left. I’m guessing maybe eight p.m.?” He felt bad when she cried harder.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “His movie got done at six thirty. He teased me about being a good girl and me beating him home. It’s why I didn’t think of mentioning it yesterday.”

  Blake got the truck turned around about half a mile closer to town than he had made it yesterday and spoke softly. “Did he head into Greenville for the movies, or did he go to the little one-screen place by the old mall?”

  “Greenville, why?”

  “Traffic. On a smooth day it’s about an hour from town to Greenville.”

  “So he might be out there?”

  “Yeah, it’s possible.”

  “I can’t think like this.” She took long, deep breaths and closed her eyes a moment.

  When she opened her eyes, her personality shifted slightly, and a calmer Sandra looked over at Blake.

  “Can we drive towards Greenville?”

  “Yeah, but do you think we can get past all the stalled cars? This isn’t too bad here, but it’s probably a nightmare further up the road.”

  “Only one way to check.”

  They were silent as they drove past the turn off for Blake’s homestead and headed towards Greenville. The fire hadn’t come as close to the highway here as it had where they assumed the jet crashed back towards the smaller town. The cars started to get thicker and thicker, and they saw people raising their heads above the seats as they slowly rumbled past. Some got out to stand in the road, and many of them shouted questions, begging for information and rides. Blake slowed down when he saw a mother and her two daughters waving him down. He had to stop or hit her. Her black sedan was gray with falling ash.

  “How is it your truck is running? Do you know what’s going on here?”

  “No, not really. My truck is old, so it doesn’t have electronics in the motor. I think that’s what makes the difference.”

  “Hey mister, can you give me a ride into Greenville?” The voice was masculine, and he turned to see about ten folks who’d slept in their cars approaching him slowly.

  “Hey, why is your truck working and ours aren’t?” another voice shouted.

  Blake didn’t panic, but he knew he was getting boxed in, and they needed to move.

  “Ma’am, you and your daughters okay here? Do you need anything?”

  “No, we slept in the car fine. I’m sure the wreckers will be coming to help us soon.”

  “Please don’t count on that. You three could come with us.”

  “What about us?” another voice shouted.

  “No, we’ll be fine here.” She smiled at him, trusting the government to put the genie back into the bottle.

  “Okay.” Blake turned and walked past some of the folks who were starting to surround him. He saw Sandra lean over and unlock his door as he got close, and he began to open it when somebody grabbed him by the arm and spun him around.

  “Hey, I asked you a question. Can you give me a ride to Greenville?” The irate man from earlier was red in the face.

  “No. No, I can’t,” he shrugged off the hand.

  A sudden shifting in the belligerent man’s eyes alerted Blake, and he was able to move his head quick enough to only get a glancing blow to the side of his face by the thrown punch. The stranger’s fist hit the solid side behind the door panel and left a small dent. He howled and shook his hand. Blake shoved him roughly back and jumped in the truck, locking the door.

  “You have to get us out of here quick, or we’re going to have to run some over.”

  “If they don’t move, I will,” Blake growled, feeling his ear with his left hand as he shifted the truck into reverse.

  People blocked his path, but they started moving when he slowly bumped into the man closest to his truck. The man’s friends had to pull him out of the way as Blake continued to back out of traffic. Hands slapped at the bed of the truck and the hood, but he ignored the angry protests until he found a large open spot and turned the truck around before speeding off.

  “Wow, that almost got really ugly. I’m not leaving the house without my gun next time,” Blake said.

  “You would have been safe.”

  “You have a gun in that little clutch?” He realized by the expression she gave him that he’d done it again.

  “No…” She pulled a small Beretta from her back waistband and set it on her lap.

  “You any good with that?”

  “Just because I was mainly in the motor pool doesn’t mean I don’t know how to use one of these things. Let’s just go back to your place. I’m sorry I almost got you hurt out there.”

  “Why are you sorry?”

  “Because I think you’re right. Dad’s car is in that traffic back there somewhere. He has to be. I just panicked, and now that reality is kicking in…”

  “Please don’t tell me it’s not as bad as I think?” Blake asked her.

  “No, Dad’s former military, just like me. He’s also a hardcore prepper. He’ll have his bag in his car.”

  “Bug-out bag?” Blake asked, familiar with a lot of the terminology that preppers used. It was also common in the homesteading movement.

  “Yeah. I just pray he was stuck outside of town when that blast went off. The way the fire was blazing, it looked like the whole world was burning.”

  “Yeah, it looked pretty bad. I know the fires aren’t out, but I can’t make them out in the distance in this daylight. So if this is an EMP, what should we be doing? I mean, almost everything back at my place was saved somehow.”

  “It’s how you did that room in the basement I think.”

  “What do you mean?”

  They turned down his lane, and he had to concentrate on the road or otherwise lose his truck to the ruts again.

  “Well, you have your electrical stuff grounded to your well. The room is basically a big grounded metal box underground.”

  “It’s not metal.”

  “How many layers of that foil-backed insulation do you have?”

  “Three or four,” he admitted. “It was all I had leftover from a couple of jobs. I was going to use something else, but it’s what I had at the time.”

  “Okay, let’s just hurry. I told my dad you lived on Holloway Lane. Maybe he’s going to make his way here if he’s alive.” A single tear escaped her eye, and she looked away into the underbrush.

  They drove in silence until he killed the motor, parking between the house and the barn.

  “What should we do?” Blake asked her again.

  “How are you set for food?”

  “You saw my garden. That’s about it, unless we go do some hunting. I never got a chance to pick up my supplies from town.”

  “Without those, do you think we have enough food for two weeks or more?”

  “Two weeks? Sure. Easily.”

  “I’m going to be peeling a lot of potatoes, aren’t I?” She smiled a moment, looking at him.

  “We both are.”

  “Let’s get some food, and we’ll take some sort of inventory.”

  “You sure are bossy,” Blake teased. She took it in stride.

  “All part of the job.”

  Chapter 6 -

  The next week was spent in the garden and in the barn. Sandra insisted on going through everything to inventory it. She tried to hide her annoyance when she’d ask how much of something Blake had. He’d always point and say “a lot” or “running low.” Right away, Sandra became the list maker and organizer as they finished unpacking the furniture into the house. Their evenings ended early with the daylight, and they took t
urns on the bed or the recliner. Every box that they had unloaded into the barn was gone through with a fine-tooth comb, and the storage unit that Blake was going to pass on, except for the mattress, contained almost a full wardrobe of lady’s clothing.

  The rest of the guns were located, along with a Ziploc bag full of documents, including the rental agreement to the storage unit. They poured through it and found out that the owner, Corey, was a lady who’d moved into an apartment in town, according to the address. She probably never had room to store the quads and safe, so she rented a unit. Blake wondered aloud what might have happened to her, but Sandra just shook her head.

  One other find that excited her was a box full of books. Four of them were from the Foxfire series, and she did a happy dance until Blake made her calm down and explain to him what that meant. They would have tried to drive to town, but they were too worried that another ugly incident would happen.

  When it became apparent to Blake that she was hell-bent on sorting through everything, he left her to it so he didn’t have to slow her down. He had thoughts of venison, and although it was out of season, he couldn’t just go to the grocery store anymore, so he went into the camper trailer and got out his long gun and a small box of ammunition, his backpack and knife, then set out for the field on foot.

  “Is everything okay?” Sandra asked, seeing him in his camo shirt and hat, armed for the first time with his rifle.

  “I’m going to go get some venison for the freezer.”

  “Okay, I’ll be right here—“

  “Sorting through everything.”

  They laughed and let it go. They’d only lived under one roof for a little under a week, but already they understood that sometimes people need a little space. Blake could tell Sandra had been trying not to get under his skin with her excitement and obsessive list making, and he knew it drove her crazy that he lived every prepper’s dream lifestyle and he was so blasé about it. He had no clue how many pounds of produce he had in the root cellar, and when he needed meat, he would do what he was doing right now, go hunting. He had little in the way of material possessions, but he lived a simpler life. Somehow he got the feeling that Sandra appreciated that kind of life, and he was growing more and more sure that she wanted to be a part of it.