Echoes of a Dying World (Book 1)

by Don M. Esquibel

  She holds my gaze a moment longer as my declaration sinks in, and then launches herself into my arms. I’m surprised at first, but then wrap her up tightly as she cries into my chest. After a minute she calms down enough to speak. “Thank you, Morgan,” she says wiping her eyes. “Just give us a minute and we’ll be ready.”

  I squeeze her shoulder once and find Felix in the doorway as I turn to leave. “We got everything we could think of,” he says.

  "Good, they just need another minute," I reply, continuing into the living room. Leon stands waiting, three backpacks and two duffel bags stuffed full around him. A minute later, Emily and Maya join us in the living room. I silently go through all we have, thinking of anything I might have missed. “We need weapons,” I say scanning the living room. No way I'll step foot outside without some way to defend myself.

  Felix pats me on the shoulder. “Already ahead of you." On the kitchen counter lies the weapons Felix managed to plunder from the apartment and maintenance room in the hall: several knives, a can of pepper spray, an emergency fire axe, a huge hammer, and a thick wooden pole nearly five feet in length. Felix grabs the axe and a sleek 5” chef’s knife before telling us to help ourselves. Leon grabs the pole and a knife, his face stoic—determined. Emily and Maya are a different story, their unease palpable as they grab butcher knives with shaky hands. To their credit, they don’t say a word, and Emily pockets the pepper spray as well. That leaves me with the hammer and two steak knives. I sheathe my weapons the best I can, silently praying I won’t have to use them.

  “Alright,” I say, addressing the group. “We have two goals we need to accomplish before we leave the city: we need food and we need camping supplies. Food is the most important.” I confer with Emily and Maya, and we agree on a grocery store in the direction we need to travel. I also pull together all the cash we have on the off chance someone somewhere will be dumb enough to think it still holds value. “Ok, we stop at the market first, but keep your eyes peeled for a sporting goods store or anywhere you might find camping supplies. Be alert for threats. Desperate people do desperate things. Don’t start anything, but if there’s a confrontation don't hesitate to defend yourself, because you can sure as hell bet they’re not worried about you. Besides that, keep close to one another and we’ll make it through this. Any questions?” I wait a moment. None come. “Then let’s get going.”

  I can sense the apprehension among us. Even worse is the fear. Despite what I would have them believe, I have no clue what waits for us out there. But I know we’re in this together, and it’s only with that knowledge do I find the courage to open the door, and take my first step into the new world.

  Chapter 3

  The hallway is dark, the bank of windows at the far end of the hallway doing little to lighten the shadows. Raised voices filter through the doors we pass, their words muffled by wood but laced with unmistakable alarm and trepidation. I can’t help but wonder what’s going through these people’s minds. Have they fully grasped the magnitude of what has happened? Do they have any idea what their next move is? And morbidly, I wonder how many of them are dead already but just don’t know it.

  There was no flashlight in the apartment, forcing us once again to navigate the dark stairwell by touch. At the bottom I push open the door, welcoming the light that trickles in from the entrance, and which grows brighter the closer we approach. As I step outside the building my senses are on overload. My pulse rises. My stomach clenches out of nerves. The pungent smell of smoke and gasoline assault my nose. My eyes flicker about, unsure where to settle with so much movement. Wrecks consume the street, creating a patchwork maze of crushed and twisted metal. People are everywhere, each in their own world, caught up in their own agendas. Injuries, both minor and severe inflict half of those I see. Some are tended to while others are left to suffer, clutching broken bones and wailing from burned skin. What's hardest to see though are the corpses: the lifeless remains of people who woke today, expecting they would do the same tomorrow.

  We stand frozen only feet outside the building, entranced by the mayhem that has erupted over the course of the morning. In our rush to reach the apartment earlier, none of this registered with me as it does now. I turn to my friends, their faces telling me I’m not the alone in that. "There's nothing we can do for these people," I say. The words sound harsh even to my own ears. I feel cold. Heartless. But we need to take care of ourselves first. "We have to move forward."

  Out of practicality, Leon, Emily, and Maya attempt to start their cars. All are dead. I knew they would be, but I couldn’t help but hope I was wrong. We walk. With each block we pass, the less I recognize the bubbly neighborhood I strolled along only hours before. It's transformed into something out of a nightmare. The shops around us are smashed in and looted before our eyes, greedy little idiots hunting after shit that no longer matters. I watch them rush past with flat-screens and laptops and I find myself amazed at their stupidity. Do they not realize how worthless these things are? That a can of soup is now worth infinitely more than the most high-end electronics? I guess not, and the knowledge gives me hope more people will set their sights on useless junk, and buy us enough time to get our hands on what we need.

  We keep close, our eyes on constant surveillance for threats. It's not easy. Movement ripples in all directions, intermingling with shouts and screams and pleas for help. Gunfire echoes in the distance, and I think to myself already there are casualties not inflicted by the bombings or EMP, but by people who worked and went to school and lived normal lives. It’s amazing what fear and uncertainty can do to a person.

  As we continue south, more organized groups move the streets, intent on fleeing this time bomb of a city. A mother tows a small child in a wagon stuffed with belongings, her husband and adolescent son shadowing her with baseball bats. A young woman about my age hurries along the adjacent street, backpack around her shoulders and infant clutched to her chest, the father keeping pace beside her, two bags slung across his back and pistol in his hand. We pass an intersection and witness an all-out brawl consuming the street to our right. A block later we come across a girl no older than ten and I curse under my breath, wondering what the hell she's doing out here alone. She’s crying and looking all around her as if an exit from the calamity will appear from thin air. I wish it would too. Maya approaches her and in a heartbeat she’s off, sprinting away in the opposite direction. Maya looks horrified and I know she’s wondering how the girl can possibly make it on her own. I don’t wonder. I know she won’t.

  Anger once again flashes through me as I think of those who did this, both for what they’ve done, and the precision with which they’ve done it. Their message was brilliant. Horrifying, but brilliant. Had they attacked the exact same way with the bombings and EMP’s, I don’t think things would have spun out of control so quickly. Without the message, the damage the bombings caused would have been isolated to those targets. The EMP’s would still have done their damage, but at first it would cause more confusion than panic. The message ensured there was no such confusion. It was the gasoline poured over the match they lit: the perfect fuel to feed the fire to consume our way of life.

  “How much farther is the market?’ I ask.

  “We’re close. Maybe another five minutes,” Emily replies. I pick up my pace. Too much time has elapsed already. How long would it take a panicked mob to empty a supermarket? In a city this size, not long. I lengthen my stride until a stream of bodies entering and exiting the market lets me know we've made it. Those who exit eye us ferally, silently warning us not to come too close. Felix and Maya grab two abandoned shopping carts halfway across the lot before meeting us up front.

  The moment I step across the entrance, I have to stop and reassess the situation. I never quite understood the phrase: this place is a zoo. Zoos are wide and spacious, animals displayed neat and orderly in their exhibits. Sure they’re swarmed by massive crowds, but it's casual: people strolling by at a leisurely pace, licking ice cream cones
and sipping sodas and resting in patches of shade. The inside of the market isn't casual, isn't leisurely, it's complete chaos—the animals now free of their exhibits, and running rampant through aisles where product litters the floor and shelves in equal proportions. It’s warm and dark, the daylight outside penetrating only feet past the glass doors. Beams of light flicker and streak about as people navigate by flashlight. One of the beams captures a man leveling a handgun at another in defense of his cart of food. The second man's eyes go wide as he ducks, and throws himself into the cover of darkness.

  I'm still trying to figure out the best place to start, thinking there must be a better strategy than blindly throwing ourselves into the fray when Maya walks forward, kneeling before a motionless body I hadn’t noticed. He’s roused to consciousness at her touch. It’s then I notice the gash above his eye and green smock he wears, a loyal employee to try and stop these people from looting. He sits up, and I’m struck with an idea.

  “Easy there, you took a good shot to the head from the looks of things,” I tell him. “Here, have a drink of water,” I add extending a bottle to him. He takes the bottle and takes a deep drink while I wait, forcing myself to be patient.

  “Thank you,” he says in a raspy voice. He clears his throat and continues more normally: “I don’t know what happened. One minute the power goes out, and then the next minute people start rushing the store, looting the place. I must have got hit when I wasn’t looking.” He looks around from his seated position. Things have deteriorated a long ways since he got knocked out. While he looks around, I quickly fill him in on everything that’s happened. He curses when I finish and asks me if I’m sure of what I told him. I choose not to answer and instead motion to our surroundings. It’s answer enough.

  “You have a family?” I ask. The kid looks terrified, he’s maybe just out of high school and it’s a lot to absorb. “My mom and sister,” he says through teary eyes, probably only just realizing the dangers they are facing.

  “My advice: grab as much food, water, and other supplies as you can cart out of here, and get somewhere safe. Out of the city if you can manage it. There’s safety in numbers, so if you have any more family or friends you can reach out to, I suggest you do so. Just be sure that you can trust them. That’s important. You have to be one hundred percent certain you can trust whoever you're with, because it’s not just your own life you’re putting in their hands, but your mom and sister’s as well. Time is key, so I suggest you take us to the storage room, and we can all get out of here as fast as possible.”

  He nods and gets up quickly to lead the way. We skirt the perimeter of the store, avoiding the jumble of bodies crammed in the aisles till we reach the back. The kid produces a key and unlocks the deadbolt with a click. He locks the door behind us and we proceed into the large room stacked with supplies. There are high windows set nearly to the ceiling offering us plenty of light to work with.

  We don’t hesitate and start to load up on anything we might need. I know there’s a chance we might have to ditch the carts at some point, but for now, we load it to the brim. We try to stick to food that is easy to prepare and won't weigh us down too much: bags of rice; cans of spam, chicken and tuna; cases of granola bars; stackable gallon water jugs; tubs of oatmeal; dry pasta; instant coffee; ramen noodles; powdered milk; Gatorade; salt and pepper; cooking oil; and flour among others.

  We'll need more than food and water though, so we make sure to load up on things like: toilet paper; hygienic products; batteries in every size we find; bandages; antibacterial wipes; hand sanitizer; soap (hand, dish, and laundry); bleach; iodine; multivitamins; painkillers; trash bags; sandwich and freezer bags; twist-ties; matches; a case of lighters; and anything else we can think of. Leon has emptied the duffle bag of supplies we took from the apartment, and is now stuffing it full of bottles of whiskey, cartons of cigarettes, and condoms.

  “You going to a party we didn’t get invited to?” Felix asks, drawing our attention to the bag. Leon laughs: “Nah, I wished” he says, zipping it shut. “Way I figure it, once things settle down a bit, people are still going to want to drink and smoke and screw.” He pats the bag with a smile. “Bag could be worth a fortune before too long.”

  I laugh despite myself. I’ve been in complete go mode, only focusing on my next move. But he’s right, the bag will be prime barter material soon. Leon stores the bag beneath the cart and I do a mental checklist of anything we might need. The truth is there are probably a dozen things we need that we’ll think of later, but nothing comes to mind now.

  “Ok then, I think we’re good,” I announce. “But we should try and everything the best we can. Try not to make it totally obvious how much we have.”

  "Here, this will work," Emily says. She pulls out a fleece blanket from her pack, setting it over one of the carts. I shake my head. Of course she had to grab the thing. Butterfly's outlined in blues and pinks and purples pop out of a black background on one side, while the reverse is monochromatic pink, embroidered with tassels of pink and blue around its edges. Leon gave it to her nearly a decade ago on her 12th birthday. He notices is it now, a small smile framing his mouth. I pretend not to notice and set about covering the second cart with Maya’s sleeping bag.

  “Alright, remember we still need to find some camping gear, so keep your eyes peeled for a sporting goods store. And it’s awesome we got our hands on all this, but it paints a big ass target on our backs. Em, Maya, I want you two behind me pushing the carts, Leon and Felix will flank you.”

  We take the emergency exit, spilling us into a wide alley behind the store. The alley isn’t deserted, but it’s not total mayhem like the streets either. There are a few groups like ours, who keep to themselves and hustle along as quick as they can. We follow the alleyways for a couple miles before we are eventually forced back onto the street, a gated lot of warehouses stopping our progress. Thankfully, the streets we now walk are considerably less congested than earlier, a trend which continues the further we travel from heart of the city. Wrecks still litter the road, people still flee and loot, but it’s starting to simmer down.

  An hour has passed since we’ve left the market, and we have yet to find a sporting goods store. Worry creeps along my spine. Surely, we can’t be the only people who have those supplies on our minds. With each passing minute, I imagine some faceless person walking away with something we need. It’s all I can do but keep my composure. At each intersection we pause to look up and down the side streets, but it’s hard to see much further than a block or so before buildings blur and become indistinguishable from one another.

  It’s during one of these stops when our first taste with violence occurs. I’m looking down a side street when I sense movement to my left, and two men emerge from behind an overturned truck. One is short, the other tall, but both are thick with layered muscle and fat. The taller is bald, a horseshoe mustache framing his mouth, while the shorter has a nest of unkempt greasy hair and a face full of acne. What catches my eye though isn't their appearance, but the chrome baseball bat, stained red with dried blood over the tall man’s shoulder, and the tire iron the shorter man taps against his meaty thigh.

  “How’s it going fellas?” I ask loudly, alerting my group to their presence. I feel them snap to attention behind me.

  “Pretty good there, boy,” Baseball Bat replies.

  “Yeah, no pigs around and little punks like you bringing us food? What more could a man ask for?” Tire Iron laughs darkly. Felix and Leon move to either side of me, keeping Emily and Maya behind us as the tension escalates. They notice the defensive positioning. “Now, now, no reason for you all to get a beating or worse,” Tire Iron says in a sing-song voice as if we were children. “Just give us the carts and you can be on your way.”

  “I don’t see that happening big man,” I reply, reaching for the hammer I’ve kept sheathed in my belt. They both laugh coldly.

  “You swing that hammer and I’ll bash your skull in. Then maybe we’ll see what was in
your head to make you do something so stupid,” Baseball Bat warns, pointing the bat at me threateningly.

  My adrenaline spikes. Blood rushes through my body, every fiber humming in anticipation. I’m scared. Not of what they might do to me, but what they might do to Emily and Maya should I go down. That’s not an option: I won’t find out. Despite everything, my hands remain steady and my voice comes out strong and calm: “Here’s the thing, I’m planning on living through this shit-storm, and to do that I’m going to need these carts. So, I’m afraid I can't let you two walk away with them. We don’t want any trouble, so if it’s all the same to you we'd like to be on our way.”

  They both laugh again, harder this time. “I’ll tell you what kid, you’ve got balls,” Baseball Bat says. "I like that in a man. Too many pussies nowadays. So, here’s what we can do: I’ll let you keep one of the carts in exchange for the other, and twenty minutes with one of those little bitches you have behind you.” Tire Iron laughs and rubs his crotch suggestively. “Oooh, I like the sound of that. I’d love to get my hands on that little blondie there. Make her squeal real good.”

  Hearing these two talk so crudely about my sister and Maya pushes me over the edge. The adrenaline bursts. Rage takes over. “You’re not going to fucking touch them!” I yell and spit at their feet. The gauntlet has been thrown and everyone knows it. There’s a stillness in the air: time itself frozen as we size each other up. I feel electric. Like a pent-up bolt of lightning, yearning for release. I didn't want this. Didn't want to be forced into a position where it's either fight or die. But I knew moments like this would come to pass the moment I realized what had befallen the world. Baseball Bat's eyes flick past us, and a heartbeat later the battle erupts.

  Felix notices the eyes flicker, the muscles tense as the two poise to strike. He doesn't wait. Quick as a flash he turns, pushing Emily and Maya to the side and spinning away at the last possible moment. A split second later a machete swings through empty air as their skinny, third accomplice misses his surprise attack. Felix straightens out and side steps a quick thrust from Machete. Machete swings in flurries, Felix barely able to bring the axe up in time to deflect each strike. He swings again and Felix jumps backward, creating distance between them. Machete steps forward in a powerful thrust, but Felix sidesteps and jabs the axe’s blunted top between his eyes, stunning him. Machete staggers back unsteadily, giving Felix the edge he needs. Felix steps forward in a high feint, then changes course mid-strike, burying the axe into Machete’s left foot. Machete howls in pain and slumps forward, defenseless. In one fluid motion, Felix rips the axe out and swings it full force into the side of Machete’s neck, dropping him to the ground where he writhes about like the desperate, dying thing he is.