Eventually, the Florida Keys disappear over the horizon, but it has minor effect on Ian. They’re on a course for Cuba, and even though they don’t have enough food or water, Ian doesn’t care that they’re leaving sight of land. He has something else on his mind. He’s stuck thinking about Markus. How he used his religion to justify his dark desires. He was the same as Ian, blinded by their points of view, their biases, their hubris, and hobbled by his inability to use reason and common sense. Ian never sought out the opinions of those that tried to disprove the conspiracies. He never took the time to think of alternative explanations. He just absorbed the lies because they were packaged so nicely.
He’s going to have to do better from now on. Ian will need to rebuild what he helped take down. In Cuba, where the radio chatter says there are survivors, Ian will need to find salvation.
#
The first day in the open sea, the night comes too soon. The isolation is a strange feeling, but not as scary as Ian thought it would be. It’s better to be out of sight of the shattered modern world and all its sharp edges.
An hour past nightfall the moon rises. It’s so huge it fills the horizon like a god. Ian thinks it is Nyx, the Greek goddess of night. She pulls on his chest like she pulls on the tides. He’s not afraid of her power. Zeus was, supposedly, but he hadn’t survived an apocalypse and gone days without food or water. Ian is at the helm, but that’s speaking loosely. He hasn’t touched the wheel in over an hour.
Another day passes, a day of ocean swells, eerie calms, and a freak squall. Now Ian is done.
They’re surrounded by water a mile deep and a million miles across, and they can’t drink a drop of it. They’re out of bottled water and booze, and the only food they have will dehydrate them so no one will eat it.
Ian feels as if he will close his eyes tonight and not open them again. As his eyelids get heavy, he stares at the reflections of a shattered moon on the ocean ripples.
Ian has no real identity any more. He’s a community organizer with no community. He’s got nothing to rail against, no corruption to fight. He’s starting to think that most of the corruption and injustice was all in his head. Humans are out for what they want and nothing more. Society, cohesion, and altruism happens because it benefits people as individuals in some way.
Ian sits up. Cuba can’t be too far away. He will fight Nyx. “You can’t take me yet, baby. Not yet,” He says. “I won’t go into your arms, no matter how warm you tell me they are.”
The compass shows the boat drifting so Ian corrects the course. He’d started drifting west in the trade winds. Ian stands on the seat at the helm, holds onto the main sheet, and stares at the horizon, but it’s as straight as the blade of a sword.
Chapter 1.37
Ian:
Finally Found
Ian is about to sit when someone makes a noise at the bow. Ian didn’t know anyone else was up top.
“Ian! Ian!” It’s Josh. He sure does love that bowsprit. In the light of the moon Ian sees his curly hairdo coming at him like a battering ram. “We’re here! We’ve made it!”
Ian hops off the helm seat and runs to him. He grabs Ian and points over the port side.
“See that?” he yells into Ian’s ear. “Lights, awesome lights!”
Ian recoils at his volume, but squints at the horizon. There’s a light, then another! They drift up into the sky like balloons.
Josh disappears, and Ian runs back to the wheel, pointing the boat southeast, toward the activity, and runs to the main sheet. Ian winds the sheet up in the winch, the ticking reverberating in the bones of his fingers. The sails tighten like muscle fibers, and the boat tips as the Pioneer picks up speed. Ian runs to the forward sheet and does the same, then tightens the jib sheets. They’re close hauled now. The Pioneer finds her comfort zone and spears through the placid ocean. She heels further and her side rail touches the water, splashing with enthusiasm.
Everyone comes up top. In the moonlight they all look like skin and bones.
A dozen more lights lift into the sky and then more and more. Ian loses track of how many. The Pioneer remains on her side and sails faster than Ian has ever sailed her. She makes great time.
As they near the source of the lights, Hana turns to him. “Oh, Ian, they’re lanterns with the candles in the middle!”
They rise into the night sky before burning out, sending glowing embers back to Earth. Everyone jumps and screams and hugs and anything else they can do to express the joy that fills their bodies. It is Eden!
An hour later they see the island of Cuba. Ian turns the boat but ends up heading into the wind, and the sail stalls. He slows in the rocking waters.
“Why are we stopping?” Hana asks, barely able to curb her excitement.
“I can’t sail upwind so I’ve got to tack back and forth to get to the lights.”
“What about the motor?” Ben asks.
Ian shakes his head. “Out of fuel. It’s okay, I got this. We’ll be there in no time.” A dozen more lights blink to life on the left, the port side, probably from hotel windows and campfires. They really have a survivor city! It has to be safe to have all the lights on. They’ve made it. They are finally saved.
Hana fires off a flair. The red light barrels high into the sky. She reloads and fires again in her excitement. Ian knows they need to be a bit closer to get someone’s attention, but with plenty of flairs, he lets her have her fun.
“Watch out, Ian!” Tanis yells. “In front of us!”
Ian turns to look where he’s going and at the last moment sees a dark coastline. The shore comes out of nowhere! Ian spins the wheel to head upwind. The boat starts to turn.
The dark closes in fast, so fast. His eyes widen as he realizes how fast he’d been going. “Hold on to something!” Ian yells.
The Pioneer hits the shore. Ian slams into the wheel, knocking the wind out of him. Everyone else falls or hits something, hard. The boat tips and turns, and the wind fills the sails. With a mighty push the gust tips the boat over and dumps everyone like a bucket turned on its side.
Ian falls and hits the shallow waves. Hana and Ben hit the water next to him. Tanis and Isabella had held on, but they let go and fall. Josh and Markus and Rice are still in the belly of the Pioneer.
With every wave the back of the boat is pushed farther on shore. The boat tries to sit up, but the wind keeps catching her sail and pushing her over again. She moans, her lines ticking in the wind like she’s crying.
Ian gasps and sits up, the waves bashing into him. “Hey, everyone okay?”
Everyone moans.
Josh sticks his head out of the cabin door. Blood spills from his left forehead, but he seems in good spirits. “We’re okay!” Josh helps Rice off the boat and into Ian’s arms. She is still covered in bandages, but healing nicely.
Josh turns to go back into the boat. “I’m getting Markus!” He disappears from view.
“Ah, leave the fucker,” Isabella mumbles as she gets to her feet.
“He’s probably dead already. No one’s peeked in on him since we ran out of water,” Ben says.
“Heads up!” Josh yells. He pushes Markus out the cabin door, and the frail old man slams into the surf.
Hana drags him out of the water. He gets to his feet and stumbles to the sand and falls. He’s thinner than everyone, more frail. Josh tells Ian to move aside so he could jump down.
Ben points to the lights on the horizon. “Great parking job, little off the mark though.”
“Eden can’t be more than a couple of miles away. We follow the beach and we’ll be there in no time,” Tanis says.
Isabella climbs up the side safety line like it’s a ladder, reaches the settee behind the wheel, and trips the cover latch with her finger. The lid opens and her M-16A, the shotgun, and a pistol fall into the water. She retrieves them easily and shakes the salt water from their breaches, barrels, and clips.
Hana, with her pistol in Markus’s back, pushes him in front of the group. “
You first.”
They head toward the wonderful lights of Eden. They pull on Ian’s heart strings like magnets, and he knows they’ll be there shortly. Though he’s starving and thirsty, his mood is pure sugar.
A dark shape comes at the group from the tree line. At first Ian thinks it’s someone who will help, but it’s not. The shape stumbles unnaturally and reaches out. It cries an unnatural cry. Another comes from the dark, then another. A mass of figures stumbles from the tree line. They shriek with glee with their sickening throats.
“Shit, dudes!” Ben cries. “There here, too! Jesus fucking shit!”
“Fuckin’ puppets,” hisses Isabella. “Can’t leave us alone, can they!”
“Back to the boat,” Ian orders. Even though it was practically on its side, it was still a place to hide. They all turn to run.
“Hey! Markus!” Tanis yells.
Markus hadn’t been able to keep up. He drops to his knees and raises his clasped hands in the air. “Go, let them have me. I’ll distract them.”
“God damn it,” Ian snaps, shaking his head in disbelief. Where was this selflessness when it mattered?
Hundreds come from the darkness. When they get to Markus they fall on him and drag him off the beach and into the jungle. Zilla is gone. His fate is what he deserves.
The Pioneer sits awkwardly on the beach, but she’ll give them some shelter. All they have to do is hope that this is low tide and that high tide will free them from the sand. They won’t be able to dig out this time. The puppets will surround them and they will never leave.
The crack of Isabella’s gun splits the air like bolts of lightning, and the light leaves green spots on Ian’s eyes.
Eden was close, so close. From out of the bear trap and into the oven they have stepped. Ian guesses this is what they deserve.
Then suddenly, the tree line bursts into bright orange flames. Heat blasts Ian’s face, and he covers his eyes from the bright light. When he looks again he sees the fire rise and turn red. It seems to come from a dozen points.
Not even the hull of the Pioneer can save them now.
They run to the Pioneer and hide behind her massive hull. Ian stands, waist deep in the surf, and tries to remain on his feet though the waves have other ideas. He’s so tired, so tired.
The flames die down, and the orange reflections vanish like the flip of a switch.
“What’re we gonna to do?” Ben mutters.
“We survive this, just like we have before.” Hana says, hanging onto Tanis with one arm and gripping Ian’s sleeve with her other.
“I can’t see good enough to hit the fuckers,” Isabella says breathing hard.
Ian notices the rowboat is still tied to the back of the Pioneer. It’s bumping the hull noisily with every wave like it’s tapping on his shoulder. “The rowboat. We can row to Eden.” Ian grabs the painter and unties it from a cleat along the rear side. He pulls the wood boat closer to shore.
Rice hobbles to the boat and throws herself into it and so does Josh. Ben and Tanis follow them. Hana holsters her pistol and looks at Ian. “I hate this little boat. I hate how cramped it is.”
“I know.”
She climbs aboard. Ian looks at the dark tree line. The puppets are still screeching and yelling, but he can’t see them from this side of the Pioneer.
Isabella climbs into the small rowboat and is just about ready to jump in when he hears a voice.
“Hey!”
Ian turns to see a man run down the beach toward them. He leaps over the first set of waves and splashes toward the rowboat.
Ian pushes the boat away from the shore as hard as he can and jumps in. “Go!”
Hana and Isabella start to row away.
The man has some kind of tank strapped to his back. “Wait! Hold on!” He dives into the water and swims to them.
Isabella leans over the edge and points her M-16A at him. “Ian, we don’t know this guy.”
“Hold your fire,” Hana says.
The puppets reach the beach and start tripping over themselves as the clamber into the waves.
The man in the water reaches up and grabs the edge of the boat. He’s gasping for air. “Help me! Come on! I just lost five of my guys trying to get to you.”
Isabella tips the muzzle of her rifle up. She looks at Ian and Ian shrugs. “We got room for one more.”
They help the man into the boat, and Isabella immediately strips him of his flame thrower.
The man has short brown hair and a thin beard. He’s strong and has a square, tight jaw. “Thanks.” He spits sea water over the side of the boat. “I was hoping for a more casual welcome, but this’ll have to do. Welcome to Eden. My name is Mitchell.” He points toward the lights on the horizon. “Home is east. If it’s not being overrun.”
“So Eden isn’t safe?” Tanis says, clearly disappointed.
“It was an hour ago. I saw your flair and left with a few jeeps and some men to come get you. We’d cleared out this area of the infected a week ago so I wasn’t worried about a thing. I saw you crash into the shore then the infected came at us from all directions. We had no idea they had come back. They were hiding for who knows how long. They’re smarter than you think.”
“Yeah, no shit,” Ben says.
Ian looks at the lights of Eden. They’ll make it their new home, though it looks like they’re gonna have to fight for it.
So not much has changed, even in salvation there’s struggle. Ian knows now that he must always fight to keep what’s his. That’s okay, he’s ready for another round.
TO BE CONTINUED. . .
Thank you for reading Fools Apocalypse!
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Sincerely,
Anderson Atlas
Thank you to all that supported me through this novel, including my family, for putting up with my writing and drawing zeal. Thank you to my critique group members: Pam, Elaine, Kate, Marilyn, Elise and to Karl and Brian, my first beta readers.
I also need to thank my editors whose expertise helped me conquer my blind spots!
KILLING SALVATION coming soon!
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About the Author
Anderson Atlas is a graphic artist, illustrator, and writer who lives in Southern Arizona with his son, daughter and wife. He loves to read, sail, hike and watch movies. When it comes to his own books, he writes and illustrates them himself, and he especially likes writing character driven stories with fun and unique twists. He has written many books from Children’s books to Young Adult books to Adult novels.
Copyright 2015 Anderson Atlas
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Published by Synesthesia Books
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