Tourists of the Apocalypse

by WALLER, C. F.

  “Help me,” I mutter as the words come to me. “She said help me.”

  Another man pokes his head out, scowling at me. He has a grey beard and is dressed in stained jeans and a tee shirt. He flies me the bird and slams the door. Yelling can be heard even at this distance. A cold chill washes over me. Is that what it looks like?

  “You can’t save anyone,” Izzy pipes up from behind me as she wraps her arms around my mid-section. “For every desperate person you see there are thousands more. You can’t pick and choose who to help. You’re not God.”

  “This coming from the gal who knew all of this was going to happen and didn’t warn anyone,” I frown, still staring at the door down the way. Dear God, was that what it looked like?

  “Right, you think we could just make a few phone calls when we arrived and sorted it all out,” she remarks in an angry tone. “Hello, excuse me, yes, I just got here from the future and as we speak China is building a massive stockpile of nukes. Yes, I’ll hold,” she smirks, pretending to wait on hold with an imaginary phone to her ear.

  “China,” I mumble. “China did this?”

  “Yeah, who did you think?”

  “Muslim extremists,” I offer. “North Korea?”

  “You might be surprised to learn that North Korea possesses almost no nuclear capability and even less in the way of rockets that fly straight. It’s all propaganda,” she reports dismissively. “Radical Muslims, give me a break. More hype. They’re good for a beheading or a mall shooting, but worldwide destruction? I don’t think so.”

  If China did this, then it stands to reason they didn’t detonate any of these over their own country. Even more likely is they hardened their infrastructure to withstand it. Does this mean China is the last superpower standing? Maybe they can help in some way?

  “So China must still have working street lights?” I suggest. “I assume they did this for a reason.”

  “Their rockets aren’t any better than North Korea’s. Most of the nukes were launched from boats. They were easily disguised on container ships that could sail anywhere. There’s a random strike pattern, but it looks like China wound up hitting the blue sky over their slice of the planet as well. Not to mention at least one missile detonated on their Mongolian border.”

  “They nuked themselves?”

  “I know right, priceless,” she snorts, but then sees my sad face. “Cheer up; they have one of the largest populations on the planet. Given much higher rates of death in crowded areas guess where you don’t want to be?”

  “Where?”

  “Shanghai or Beijing,” she declares. “Over 24 million lost souls reside in each. The worst parts of the bible are playing out there right about now.”

  This revelation is shocking, but what isn’t these days? During the night we hear glass breaking and fighting in the street. Izzy sleeps with the gun on the nightstand and advises me not to open the door to peek out. When squinting through the peephole proves pointless, I abandon my desire to watch the proceedings and return to bed. It’s like a marathon of the Cops television show. The shampoo has left Izzy smelling of flowers. I sleep surprisingly well with my arms around her. How can I be this happy in the midst of all this pain?

  DAY FOUR

  The storm has lessened, but the rain still falls in sheets across the road. Izzy decided we go tonight storm or not. It’s possible all the rain will clear people off the roads, but it’s unlikely the weather extends all the way to our destination.

  We receive several knocks at the door in the morning. When the knockers look benign through the peep hole, I open the door. The first two were looking for food and we assured them we don’t have any. The expression on their faces shows their distrust of our answer, but the sight of Izzy standing behind me with the gun keeps them moving. A third much older man, possibly sixty, asked if Izzy would be bathing today and if so, what time. Rather than be offended, she laughed and told him he would just have to wait and see. Clearly she likes the attention.

  I am eager to get moving, but at the same time find it hard to go. The time spent here has been wonderful. Even with all the craziness, being with Izzy is the only thing on my mind. Going back means having to deal with Lance. She seems to think we won’t last out here, thus making the decision for us. When I ponder the possibilities, part of me is willing to risk the hazards to keep Izzy to myself. No matter what happens, if we make it back, Lance and I are going to have a serious conversation. One that’s probably going to be at gunpoint.

  At dusk, we stand in the doorway planning our egress. The rain has all but stopped and the sun is setting in a spectacular orange haze. Izzy points to the left and explains the highway entrance ramp is a mile or so in that direction. A few abandoned cars can be seen in the road, but most were pushed off to the side, before their owners realized their predicament was permanent. I suggest she let me disable the marker lights so the car is harder to see, but she is wary of my altering the car in any way. As usual, Izzy wins the dispute by disrobing.

  It’s pitch dark by nine o’clock and we begrudgingly crawl out of bed and dress an hour later. Izzy manages to get all the supplies returned to the backpacks. There are a dozen people in the street, freed from the coffee shop by clear skies. Before we get out of the room, a door flies open down the walkway. The rough looking bearded man from the other day tosses the woman in the pencil skirt onto the concrete. The skirt is around her knees, her panties mid-thigh. Her top is still soaking wet, but there’s clearly no bra under it now. Even at this distance I can see a welt on her cheek nearly closing one eye. She scoots away from the man on the ground, but another man pushes past him and grabs her by the ankle.

  “Don’t toss her out,” he barks drunkenly as he pulls her back to the door. “It’s not like we have to feed her.”

  “Leave her go,” the Beard argues. “There’s plenty out there now.”

  “Yeah, but I don’t feel like training another one.”

  The woman sobs, clawing at the ground, but only managing to break off her fingernails. Izzy looks at me without speaking and shakes her head. This is insane. Has it come to this in four lousy days? Two men who have also witnessed this start over to the room, but once the woman is dragged back inside, the Beard returns brandishing a baseball bat. The rescuers slow to a stop more than likely weighing the possibility of injury.

  “Nothing to see here,” Beard snarls, then glances down at me. “What are you looking at whistle britches?”

  Before I can reply Izzy pulls me back in the door and slams it.

  “No, no, no,” she howls. “We let them go back in and then bail. You’re not getting us killed over some office princess in bondage.”

  “Fine,” I reply without hesitating. “I get it. Can we go already?”

  She looks stunned, as if she was expecting me to fight with her. Or maybe she’s surprised at my suddenly callous attitude. I push open the door, seeing that the animal’s door is shut and take Izzy by the hand.

  “I’m not helping anyone so let’s just go.”

  We pass their door, which is the last, and enter the employee lot. The windows are still in the car, which is good news. She has backed it in which is also good for us. She walks me to the driver door and opens it, telling me to put the backpacks in the rear seat. I’m rushing, so by the time I look up, she’s slamming the trunk, revealing the shotgun.

  “What,” I blurt out, but she tosses the keys at my chest.

  If she didn’t hit me with them I might not have caught them in the dark. She racks the shotgun and takes a deep breath. Where is this going?

  “Start the car,” she orders. “When you hear the first shot pull around in front of the door and pick me up.”

  “What door,” I mutter, confused. “Wait, what shot?”

  “You know which door Dylan, now get in the car.”

  Her face is unfamiliar to me. It’s hard and her voice is deep and scratchy. I start to ask another question but she points the business end of the gun at me and s
houts.

  “Car, now.”

  Either out of loyalty or fear I slide in and turn over the engine. It cranks, but won’t fire. I try several times, but it turns over slower each time. Unsure at first what I am doing wrong the answer finally comes to me. It’s not fuel injected dummy. I crank it and tap the gas several times. The engine sputters, then roars to life. I don’t know what’s under the hood, but the car vibrates as if a jet engine was housed in the front. I’m fluttering the pedal, lost in the man zone of a revving engine when the first gunshot erupts into the night. Where is Izzy?

  Pulling the shifter down, I peel around the corner, nearly hitting a woman and a man fleeing from the war zone. When I skid to a stop in front of the animal’s door there is another boom, then one of the men from earlier comes crashing out of the door. He lands face down, a foot-wide bloody spot on his back. Two more shotgun blasts ring out. I start to get out of the car, before seeing Izzy exiting the door. She has the poor woman in tow, pulling her out of the room and pointing at the coffee shop. The woman points at the car and sobs. She clearly wants to go with us.

  I can’t hear the ensuing conversation with the windows rolled up, they are crank ups and the handle is out of reach on the passenger side. Izzy puts the barrel of the shotgun in her back as she turns her with a hand on her shoulder. Is she going to shoot her as well? I start to call out, but Izzy simply pushes her with the end of the shotgun, driving her down the walkway in the direction of the coffee shop. The woman stumbles and then turns back. Her skirt is back around her waist, but her panties are still around her thighs, tripping her up. Her shirt is stained with blood that’s running off her neck, probably starting on her face. I hope it’s her face. The car door is pulled open and Izzy jumps in, lowering the shotgun to clear the window frame.

  “What did you do?” I gasp, turning the car around, speeding away.

  “Something stupid,” she coughs, wiping her face with the back of a hand.

  I have to swerve around at least a dozen cars before we get to the highway. Most of the cars are pushed to the side and I wind it up to sixty before Izzy puts a shaky hand on my leg.

  “Slow down,” she chokes out. “Even with the high-beams you can’t see crap. No more than fifty.”

  “You told me we can’t save anyone,” I growl, trying to look at her, but she’s looking out the side window.

  “I didn’t save her,” she groans, sounding like she’s going to be sick. “Stop the car.”

  I slam on the brakes and she throws open the door and vomits on the road. She wretches three times, pausing between the spasms to gasp for breath. I put a hand on her back to comfort her, but she swipes at it in an attempt to push me away. After the puking stops, she pulls the door shut and points forward. I don’t say anything but reach my hand over and take hers. She squeezes it hard and we ride in silence. I wouldn’t know what to say even if I wanted to talk.

  I drive and she points out possible problem areas for the next two hours. The rain and the storm seem to have driven most people off the highway in search of shelter. At some point, I ask her to count mile markers, but she pulls out her cell phone instead. Plugging it into a charging cable in the glovebox, she affixes it to a stand with an articulated arm.

  “Here,” she points. “Follow the blue line. The miles to target are on the side.”

  “That can’t possibly work?”

  “Why not? The phone’s hardened and the satellites are still up there,” she explains. “All it’s doing is reporting our position and displaying it.”

  I lean forward and push the power button on the radio. Nothing happens and I try several more times. This seems to amuse Izzy, who pulls her feet up on the seat and tosses her arms over her knees.

  “No radio?” I complain.

  “It’s fried,” she sighs. “If it was an old tube radio we’d be fine, but what stations did you think would be operating?”

  “I was hoping for a CD player.”

  Leaning forward to tap on her phone, I see the ITunes application. Taylor Swift’s Shake it off blares from the tiny phone speaker. Izzy raises and eyebrow and nods at the tiny jukebox.

  “Is Taylor big five hundred years from now?”

  “Huge,” she sighs, rolling her eyes in a comical gesture.

  “That figures,” I grin, putting my arm out.

  She slides over next to me, pulling the shotgun over as she does. We ride like this for some time. Izzy trembles just a bit and I’m not sure if it’s the mass murder she just committed or the ragged looking people we pass from time to time. At one point we pass three bloody bodies lined up neatly next to a semi-truck. There is a man sitting with the back doors open eating a bag of potato chips, which were obviously his cargo. He waves at me as I pass, his shirt cuff stained crimson. It’s the theater of the absurd out here.

  DAY FIVE

  The sun is just coming up over the horizon when the abandoned car situation gets worse, nearly blocking the road. Its bad luck and we come to a virtual stop just before Hattiesburg. Izzy checks the time on her phone. We’ve been driving for almost six hours and traveled only 165 miles. There is no way we will make it at this rate. We sit idling behind two semi-trucks that block our way. To the right, a line of small cars have been pushed off, making it impossible to pass. The left is clear, but the shoulder is waterlogged.

  “How much gas?” Izzy demands, breaking the silence.

  “Quarter tank.”

  “Back up,” she orders. “Go back a few hundred feet. There’s a minivan back there we can use to fill up.”

  “Why back?”

  “We can’t see past the semi-trailers,” she complains. “We have no idea what’s on the other side. Give me a couple of football fields space and we can crack open a few gas tanks.”

  Having no better plan, I toss my arm over the seat and shift into reverse. I have to weave around dead cars and wind up scraping the back fender. I receive a punch in the arm on this occasion. A red Ford is our first victim. Izzy stands guard while I push the rubber hose in the tank and watch it drain. There is a hard plastic ring that slides on the hose. It keeps the flap by the gas cap from making it hard to the get the hose out. The whole thing is brilliant. We choose a green Chevy next and share a Slim Jim and cracker breakfast. I think we eat slow hoping the answer to our problem will present itself. When it doesn’t, I speak up.

  “What do we do about that?” I ask, pointing at the trucks blocking the road ahead.

  “Think you can make the other side,” she ponders aloud, pointing at the oncoming lanes across the median. “I mean, do you think we’ll get buried in mud? It has to be wet under that grass.”

  “Our other choice being?”

  “Try the shoulder next to the truck on the left,” she suggests, bobbing her head. “Cross our fingers that there is nothing waiting on the other side of the truck.”

  “You’re paranoid.”

  I receive a nose wrinkle and a huff. She’s wearing her Texas A&M visor and hoodie today and she’s cute as a button. If not for the shotgun, the visual would be perfect. Although the image with the firearm is pretty hot.

  “Or, I could just walk up and see what’s past the blockage,” I offer.

  “Yeah, that’s safe,” she snorts.

  There’s a sound from behind, causing us both to turn. Three men and a woman are jogging down the road in our direction, arms waving frantically. They don’t appear menacing, but as I expect Izzy orders me to pull the hose so we can go. I start to argue, but she’s taken a few steps away, holding the gun to her shoulder. When the rubber hose is rolled up, I slam the trunk.

  “Put it in gear and keep your foot on the brake,” she orders.

  In the rear view, I watch her fire a warning shot in the air as the group draws near. Good Lord she’s paranoid. I can’t imagine we are far enough into this nightmare that we need to fire warning shots. The group seems to be more begging than dangerous. The look like typical abandoned on the road folks. Izzy shakes off any reques
ts and walks backward to the car, keeping an eye on them. When she gets in, I take my foot off the gas and let the car roll forward.

  “Danger averted?” I ask sarcastically.

  “Maybe,” she mutters, nodding her head forward. “We got company.”

  Up ahead, a half dozen figures move past the semi-trailers blocking the road with eyes on us. They are probably camping in the trucks waiting for help. The warning shot stirred them up no doubt. Way to go my darling.

  “Nice warning shot,” I complain.

  “You’re looking at this all wrong. We were about to drive down the shoulder. Now we know that would have been a mistake.”

  “Actually I was going to walk down the side, which would have been a mistake as well.”

  “You’re welcome,” she insists. “Hit it, cross the median.”

  “And if we get stuck?”

  “Then we hope they’re nice enough to push us out,” she suggests.

  “And if they’re not nice?”

  “Then jerk your pistol and let them have it G.I. Joe,” she taunts me.

  I don’t answer as for a girl who tossed her cookies last night, she seems awfully eager to enter into a shoot-out with truckers. I gun the engine and start down the highway. They probably don’t have guns anyway. I have to weave between three cars before turning to the left and hitting the grass. The car fishtails when I first get off the pavement, but then almost picks up speed. We drop down then hit the center where it angles back up and the jolt causes me to hit my head on the roof.