Surviving Chaos

by Ryan Westfield

“I’ll go look for some mushrooms, then,” said James, as Sadie went to get some more water.

  Mandy nodded at him. “I don’t need to tell you to take your gun.”

  “No,” said James. “No, you don’t.”

  The guns, though, were a problem. It’d been easier when they’d had all the rifles they could need, and all the ammo to go along with them.

  But the ammo had all been stolen. They were down to two handguns, and not much ammo. The rule was that one gun had to be at camp at all times, and if someone was out on their own, they needed the other gun.

  James walked off, leaving Mandy and Sadie behind. He got to a place where he couldn’t hear their voices. He sat down, his back against a tree, and breathed a sigh of relief. The stress was getting to him. Part of that stress was just being at the camp. Sadie wasn’t helping, but it would be stressful even if she’d been more cooperative.

  James opened the small book on edible plants. He found the mushroom section, and started reading, making sure to move his eyes around his surroundings once in a while. It wouldn’t be good to get lost in a book, not when at any moment the unexpected could happen.

  According to the book, there might be some edible mushrooms around, given the time of year and location. But the only problem was that they looked very similar to the infamous death cap mushroom, a pale white mushroom that almost always caused death, unless the proper antidote was given.

  They had no antidotes with them.

  Would it be worth it, as an amateur mushroom hunter, to try to add a few more calories to their diet, at the risk of death?

  James didn’t know. But his stomach was telling him that it was certainly worth it.

  9

  Max

  They were hunting Max like an animal.

  The pain in his leg was intense. He wanted to scream. But he made no sound.

  He’d sprinted away from the man he’d knocked down. The revolver was in his hand.

  The crowd was somewhere close. They cried out for his blood, his flesh.

  Max didn’t think about what would happen if they caught him.

  The noise from the crowd seemed to be on all sides. There wasn’t an easy way out.

  Max made it into another backyard, and crouched underneath a large dead rose bush. He was breathing heavily with exertion.

  He needed time to figure out his next move. But there was no time.

  The only thing he had going for him was that he knew with certainty that violent force was appropriate. He’d have no qualms about shooting those who wanted to hang him just so they could consume his flesh.

  How many yards were there to go before he was back by the road he’d come in on? He’d been trying to keep track, but somewhere in the chaos he’d lost it. Five? Six? Hopefully not as many as ten.

  Max felt his blood sugar crashing. The adrenaline was coursing through him, drawing out the last of his glycogen reserves. It wasn’t the time to stop for a snack, but in this moment it was necessary. He seized one of the Mounds bars, tore off the wrapper, and shoved it into his mouth, chewing as quickly as possible.

  Moments later, he felt his blood sugar stabilizing, his energy returning slightly.

  Max got up. The leg roared with pain.

  There wasn’t a fence between these two yards. Max kept low, crouching down. This put more pressure on his bad leg.

  There was a car in the driveway. But there hadn’t been one before. Had Max gone the wrong way, down some different street? He’d thought there weren’t many streets here. But it was possible he’d gotten turned around.

  Should he go to the car? Try to get it to start?

  No. It was too risky. The noise of the crowd was too close. There wouldn’t be enough time to break into the car. And if it didn’t start, then that would be it for Max.

  Up ahead, there was no end in sight to the rows of houses. In the farthest yard he could see, figures appeared. Ten of them. Maybe a dozen. They were headed in Max’s direction.

  Shit.

  There was no way out.

  The only thing to do was hide. It gave him a chance. Not a good one. But it was something.

  Max’s eyes scanned the area rapidly.

  There was a shed, but it’d be useless to hide in. It’d be the first place to look.

  Could he hide in the car? Or the house?

  Max had to think fast.

  He ran across the yard, towards the house. Not too far to go.

  But they saw him. He heard them yelling. “There he is!” They cheered with frenzied anticipation, their cheer becoming a loud dull roar. Left unrestrained, this was what humanity had come to.

  If he went into the house, there’d be no way out. He’d be a dead man.

  Max ran to the house’s backdoor. He didn’t stop running. He threw himself against it, letting his shoulder hit the wood. Hard. The door cracked. Max drew himself back, and gave it another blow.

  It wasn’t yet open. Max gave the door a tremendous kick, making contact with the sole of his boot.

  The door was open. Max left it like that.

  He wanted the mob to think he was in the house.

  A mob was so dangerous in part because it worked almost as a single organism. The thoughts of the individuals were almost gone. But Max could use that to his advantage. An individual might think that there was the possibility that Max hadn’t entered the house. But a mob wouldn’t.

  At least that was what Max hoped.

  There was no way to know for sure.

  Max rushed back to the car, and got himself underneath it just as he heard the mob arriving.

  “He’s in the house!” someone shouted.

  Max was breathing heavily. He tried to slow his breathing, to make no noise. Likely no one could hear him anyway. The mob was noisy, their boots practically slamming into the ground.

  Max had lost weight, but it was still incredibly snug underneath the car. The exhaust manifold was pressed into his shoulder.

  Max waited. It sounded like everyone was in the house.

  He had his head turned to the side, but he couldn’t see much at all.

  If he waited too long, to make sure the coast was clear, he risked having the mob catch him as they left the house.

  He’d try to make a break for it.

  The pesticide container was lying on its side next to Max. He wouldn’t leave without it, even if it slowed him down. He gripped it tightly.

  Max slid himself out from underneath the car. The pavement tore at his jacket. It was hard with his injured leg to move himself sideways.

  But he was out.

  The noise from the house was deafening.

  “He’s not here!” someone shouted from inside.

  Max only had moments.

  He spun his head, looking around.

  No one.

  Max dashed off, heading straight down the middle of the road. He’d be in plain sight if anyone was there.

  And there certainly would be someone. There were too many people to avoid all of them.

  But all he had to do was avoid the majority of them.

  He’d fight. He’d have to.

  He hoped he was going in the right direction.

  Max only heard his breathing, ragged and intense, and his boots against the pavement. His vision had become a tunnel.

  His gait was lopsided from his limp and the gas container in his left hand.

  His right hand clutched the pistol.

  His body was exhausted. He was almost totally spent. He pushed himself, harder than he’d ever thought possible. Every muscle ached. Every injury roared with pain.

  Max didn’t turn his head to look to see if they were following him. It didn’t matter. He was running as hard as he could. Nothing could make him run faster. He’d already reached his physical limits.

  He barely knew where he was. The stress, the extreme exertion… it was all so much. The body and mind only had so much energy.

  In front of him, there was a big white house, with busted
shutters and ivy growing all over it.

  Max was rapidly approaching the house.

  Nothing made sense… His mind was having trouble putting the pieces together.

  Then he realized it. He’d reached a dead end. A cul-de-sac street.

  He’d definitely gone the right way.

  There was only one way to go. Max’s boots hit the yard and he kept running, right around the side of the house, not knowing where it might lead to.

  The backyard was large, stretching far on all sides.

  “He’s in the backyard!” A young, loud voice came dancing down from where Max had just come.

  Max stopped, completely physically spent, in the middle of the huge, empty back yard. He turned to see three young men walking towards him.

  A fence ran around the entire periphery of the yard, tall and smooth. Max took one look at it and realized he couldn’t climb it. It was smooth metal, painted black. Many heads higher than Max was. Even if he used the pesticide container as a foot stool, there was no chance he could get over it.

  Max ran his eyes across the men.

  One had a baseball bat that he swung casually at his side. Another had a kitchen knife. The third was unarmed.

  None of them had guns.

  Max stood there, drenched in sweat, completely filthy, his clothes torn in places.

  His entire body ached, but he stood straight and tall.

  Max raised the pistol, pointing it at them.

  “Don’t take another step.”

  “What? You’re going to shoot us?”

  “That’s right.”

  “You can’t shoot us all.”

  They kept walking towards Max.

  Max didn’t want to kill them. They were young men. Before the EMP, they’d have had futures ahead of them, possibilities of forging their own families, of traveling the world, of the thousand possibilities that life used to offer.

  But they’d changed along with everyone else. There was hunger and deadness in their eyes. They’d succumbed to the mob mentality. They’d lost everything and they were angry, an anger that boiled deep in their muscles and bones.

  They wanted to strike out. They wanted to hurt someone. They wanted to cause pain. Society had let them down, deceived them. They needed a target.

  Max was that target.

  “You really want to sacrifice yourselves, so that one of you might kill me?” said Max.

  They didn’t respond.

  There wasn’t much time. They were blocking Max’s only exit. The other side of the house was blocked by the fence.

  If he waited any longer, others would come.

  Max might be able to take out the three of them. But if more arrived, that’d be it for him.

  Max regretted it even before he did it. But he did what he had to do.

  He took good aim, right in the stomach of the one with the knife, and squeezed the trigger.

  The gun kicked.

  A scream.

  The man fell.

  The two others broke into a sprint, rushing Max.

  Max got off one more shot. The second one fell, screaming. Max’s shot hadn’t been perfect. It hadn’t been a killing shot, but he didn’t know where he’d gotten him.

  There wasn’t time for a third.

  This was the unarmed young man. He’d lost weight since the EMP, but he had an athletic frame. Strong and powerful, and fresher than Max was. He hadn’t been hunted like a dog through streets and backyards.

  He collided with Max, tackling him to the ground.

  The back of Max’s head hit the earth hard. His vision swam.

  The guy was on top of Max, his weight pressing down onto him. He raised his arm, his hand in a tight fist. It came down hard, hitting Max on the side of his head.

  The pistol was no longer in Max’s hand. Maybe it had fallen when he’d knocked his head.

  Max tried reaching for his Glock in its holster, but the guy suddenly pinned Max’s arm in place, thrusting his whole weight onto both of his arms, his hands wrapped tightly around Max’s wrist. His face was a snarl as he stared down at Max.

  Max’s left hand was free. He shoved it into his pocket, where his knife was clipped. His fingers closed around the knife.

  The guy pulled up his right hand, ready to swing again.

  Max struggled with his right, to distract the guy, but the guy’s weight was too much.

  Max’s thumb found the hole in the blade, and he flicked the knife open. This wouldn’t be the first time his knife had saved him.

  Max jammed the knife hard into the guy’s side, just as the second punch hit him in the face.

  The guy screamed. Max pulled out the knife and jammed it in again, stabbing hard and without mercy.

  Max’s vision was blurred, and he hurt. But he thrust again with the knife, driving it deep into the man’s flesh.

  Max shoved the body off him. He needed a moment to recover, but he didn’t have a moment. For all he knew, more people were coming. There’d been screams, loud enough to attract plenty of attention.

  Max stood up, his hand going for his Glock. It felt good to have it back in his hand. He picked up the pistol, too, flipped the safety, and stuck it into his waistband.

  The pesticide container with the gas was lying nearby. It’d been knocked over. Max picked it up, his vision going strange as he bent down.

  Max’s head hurt like hell.

  He pushed the toe of his boot against the body he’d pushed off himself. The guy was dead all right.

  But one of three wasn’t yet dead. He’d been the victim of Max’s second shot, the one Max barely had time to get off. He lay there, bleeding from the side of his chest. His breathing was ragged and heavy. When he opened his mouth to moan in pain, there was blood around his teeth.

  Max walked over to him, pointing the Glock at his head.

  The only humane thing to do was to put him out of his misery. He wouldn’t recover from the wound he had. He’d only suffer.

  Max’s face was grim when he squeezed the trigger.

  There wasn’t any time to waste. Max headed back out the way he’d come. He was in more pain than when he’d come in. Three lives had been lost. And all for what? To get out of a backyard? It was crazy.

  But Max didn’t think about that. He had a long way to go, and more battles to fight. He looked down the street, his vision fuzzy.

  It looked clear. But Max knew better than to make assumptions. Things weren’t always the way they seemed. They hadn’t been in a long time.

  10

  John

  The night was only getting colder.

  Cynthia was close by, maybe a foot away. John could hear her breathing.

  The forest was completely silent, except for the moans of pain of the man that John had shot.

  It hadn’t been a good shot. He’d only had the flashlight to go by.

  John and Cynthia knew there were more people out there. But they didn’t know how many. They didn’t dare turn on their own flashlights. It would give away their position immediately.

  They didn’t even speak now, unless they had to.

  Kiki seemed to understand, in some instinctual way, the gravity of the situation. She was nearby, probably up against Cynthia, keeping very quiet.

  John’s pulse was racing. He felt an intense fear running through him, and it didn’t leave him. He’d felt fear plenty of times since leaving his apartment in Center City Philadelphia, and there was always that subtle fear in the background of all his thoughts.

  But this was different. Maybe it was the intensity of the darkness, of the night that seemed to close in on them. Maybe it was the thought of being hunted. Maybe it was the uncertainty, not knowing how many people were out there, after them. Maybe it was the knowledge that the compound, somehow, must be involved in this.

  This was true fear. John knew that for certain.

  Had that man they’d met, who’d told him about Max, betrayed them? Had anything he’d told them been true? Maybe he’d to
ld John what he’d wanted to hear, and then promptly alerted his friends back at the compound.

  Maybe some of it had been true. Who knew what to think.

  John wanted to say something reassuring to Cynthia. He knew she must have been terrified, practically petrified. But there was nothing to say. Nothing that could make it all better. Anything he said would have been a lie.

  It was so dark that sound was all they had. And John didn’t know whether they’d be able to hear someone approaching or not.

  His mind raced through a series of horrible possibilities. What if those pursuing them had night vision goggles? Would those have survived the EMP? What if they had something else, something John couldn’t even think of?

  Then again, if that was the case, they’d already be dead.

  Suddenly, a voice called out in the silent darkness.

  A woman’s voice.

  “I don’t want to hurt you,” came the voice.

  Cynthia’s hand clutched John. Neither she nor John spoke.

  There was silence again.

  Finally, John spoke.

  “What do you want?”

  “I know you have a woman in your party.”

  John didn’t dare speak again. There was the danger of giving away their position.

  The woman’s voice sounded fairly far away. But it was hard to tell. She was yelling, and her voice seemed to ricochet around the unseen trees.

  “We want the woman, and nothing else. Hand her over, and we’ll let the rest of you go.”

  There was a lot of information in that sentence. The woman was claiming she was a member of a larger party, but John had his doubts. If she really had others with her, aside from the ones who’d already been killed, then she probably would have wanted to downplay their numbers for purely strategic reasons. But if she was by herself, then it might be to her advantage to exaggerate the numbers.

  The unseen voice also seemed to think that there were more people than just John and Cynthia.

  “What do we do?” came Cynthia’s voice, as she dared to whisper.

  “We fight.”

  They waited in the silence for what felt like an hour. In reality, probably only minutes had passed.