The Long Dark

by Billy Farmer

  “Follow me,” I said. Everyone jumped as a loud noise came from one of the floors below us. “I know another way. Miley showed me another way. Come on.”

  Sam paused, unsure whether to trust my crazy ass. “You better know what you’re doin or we screwed.”

  “I’m good. I’m okay,” I said.

  As the others grabbed as much as they could carry, I remembered the backpack Miley had given me. I reached under the desk and grabbed it. I then opened the large cabinet door that led to the secret stairwell. With another bang sounding from just down the hall, no one had time to linger on the oddity of Miley having a secret passage.

  Once in the garage, I handed a flabbergasted Sam the keys to the vehicle. Without comment, he hopped in and started the engine. It fired up on the first try. Everyone else loaded the provisions into the back of the vehicle. Within just a few moments, all of us were loaded in and ready to go. Sam looked to me.

  As scared and confused as I was in that moment, I understood the necessity of an expedient exit from the garage. Competing with that necessity was the overwhelming fear I felt after Kelley and Bob’s admissions – the fear I knew my friends would feel when I told them about what I’d learned. It was no longer a theorizing game, in which I hoped for the best, and the worst was just something that happened in movies or television shows. If the Order was successful, the world outside that garage was going to be a terrible place.

  I wanted to savor one last moment in the garage. I then pressed the button on the garage door opener. “Let’s go.”

  * * *

  Author's note:

  Well, there you have it, my first ever book. One of the first iterations of this book was written in 2014. During which time it was going to be more of an alien versus us kind of book. The Patch, William, and Avery were still in that version, but you would hardly recognize them. William was a nerdy scholar type, while Avery was kind of undefined – more of a tertiary character at best. The Patch was still a thing. Actually, the entire story, for me, revolved around the Patch, even though the first book didn’t linger there too long. The thought at the time was I wanted to write something about a cold, dark, and isolated place. Everything else sort of was created off that premise.

  You’ll notice that some of the Grays act slightly differently than what is assumed from zombies. They carried, and on some level, knew how to use weapons. Although this isn’t exactly new in zombie literature, I wanted that to be the starting point. In other words, I wanted to repurpose zombies into weapons. This is where the Order comes into play.

  As the story progressed, I started reading about CRISPR editing tools, and this really changed the arc of the story more than anything else. My thinking was, if the average Joe could get his hands on tools that would allow him to edit the human genome, what would happen if an entire country (or countries) put their energy into using genome editing for nefarious reasons, well, then they could do some pretty terrible things. Look for more of this in book 2.

  Hopefully the story is enjoyable to you. It’s been a longtime coming for me to finish these books. I do work fulltime at my non-writing gig, so my schedule will be tight. Having said that, I do plan on publishing book 2 in May or June.

  I appreciate everyone who has downloaded and read my story. It means the world to me. Thank you.

  If you have any questions or comments, please check out my Facebook page: www.facebook.com/B.J.FarmerAuthor or email me at: bill@billyjoefarmer.com