The day after: An apocalyptic morning

by Jessy Cruise

  He waited some more, staying in place as the landscape around him grew darker and darker. He had a narrow window in which he would be able to act. He had managed to place himself so he could approach the bridge without being detected by their cameras, but he could only avoid detection by the guards themselves if he waited until it was too dark to be seen by them. At the same time however, he needed some light so he could see where he was going as he moved along the ledge to the bridge. Trying to negotiate that last fifty yards in complete darkness was a thought that did not even bear contemplating.

  Fortunately it was easy to tell when that particular window had been reached. When Skip could no longer see across the canyon, he knew it was time. He pulled himself out of his hiding place and continued his trip along the ledge, taking each step carefully and slowly. Several times he dislodged loose rocks, sending them tumbling downhill and over the edge. Thankfully the deafening roar of the water below easily masked the sound that this created.

  At last he reached the bridge. He ducked under one of the massive steel supports and, utilizing the last of the light available to him, scrambled up another ridge until he was able to put his hands on the maintenance catwalk. This narrow access was suspended from the bottom of the bridge by steel support beams that were located every twenty feet. During his examination earlier that day, he had counted these beams, finding that there were exactly 198 individual supports on each side. Now, he pulled himself up and ducked under the handrails that had been mounted along the length on both sides. He put his feet on the grated metal surface and breathed silent thanks that he had managed to make it to relative safety without falling to his death.

  Just behind him was an L-shaped platform that protruded outward to the edge of the bridge. It had a ladder bolted to it that allowed access up onto the roadway. Skip knew that there was another such platform at the other end of the bridge, exactly 192 support columns away from where he now stood. The townspeople had foolishly left the two ladders in place. He had no interest in the ladder behind him since it only would have led him directly up to where the cameras were pointing. But the ladder on the other end, that one he had uses for.

  He began to walk along the catwalk, keeping his hands on the handrail as he went. He stepped carefully, his boots treading along the grated surface. Each time his hand passed over one of the support beams he counted off silently to himself, thus keeping track of his progress. He was disconcerted to discover that the entire catwalk was rocking gently back and forth in the wind, the sway increasing the further out over the canyon that he went. He began to wonder about the structural integrity of the surface he was walking on. Was it possible that the earthquake had loosened the catwalk but left the bridge intact? Not being an engineer, he simply didn't know. But he had gone too far to turn back now.

  By the time he reached column 96, the light had disappeared completely, forcing him to move by feel only. Though this was part of his plan he still was forced to struggle with doubts about his ability to ascend back to the roadway blindly. True he had obsessively studied the ladder on the other side of the bridge through his rifle scope that afternoon, and true, he had the layout of the platform memorized to the last detail, but now that the reality of what he was doing was here, worry assaulted him.

  Nevertheless, he pushed on. Skip was not a quitter. The closer to the far end of the bridge he came, the slower and more carefully he walked. For the first time he wondered if maybe the guards up above had another night vision equipped video camera that they used to periodically check the catwalk with. It would be a simple Micker of climbing out of their SUV from time to time and leaning over the access ladder to point the camera downward. Surely they hadn't completely disregarded the possibility that someone would infiltrate them in the manner that he was now utilizing. After all, despite a few glaring security breaches they had proven themselves to be rather clever.

  Oh well, he finally concluded, if that was the case then they would catch him. There was simply no way for him to counter that possibility. He continued on.

  Nearly thirty minutes after he had started walking across, Skip's hand finally touched the 192nd structural support beam. He stopped, listening carefully but hearing nothing but the rushing water. This did not make him feel any better.

  He shuffled forward a few more steps, using the handrails to support his weight while his left foot stretched out over the side of the catwalk. It encountered nothing but empty air for the first couple of steps but finally, right where he had thought it would be, it encountered the grated surface of the ladder platform stretching out to the side. He withdrew his foot and stepped two more steps forward, turning to his left as he went and facing out over the canyon. He moved his foot around again, familiarizing himself with the small dimensions of the platform. It was narrower than the catwalk surface, only about eighteen inches wide, barely enough to squeeze between the rails.

  He ducked under the catwalk handrail and made his way out onto the platform. Moving as slow as ever, he began to move outward at a 90-degree angle. The platform extended out a little more than ten feet, to just beyond the edge of the bridge, and then it made another 90 degree turn to the right. This last section was only about two feet long, just big enough to house the ladder that led up to the guardrail and the roadway. When he reached the turn in the platform he looked upward into the darkness, the rain falling on his face. He saw absolutely nothing, nor did he hear anything. He took the fact that no one was challenging him or shooting at him to be a sign of his success so far.

  He turned his body around and, groping blindly, finally found a rung of the ladder. He pulled himself over to it and gave it a soft, experimental tug to see if it was loose or if it was going to rattle as he climbed. It seemed relatively solid in its mountings so he put his foot on the first step and pulled himself upward. He climbed one step at a time, pausing as he went up each rung, until finally his hand touched the top of the guardrail itself.

  He pulled himself up two more steps until his head was up over the rail. The end of the bridge would be about ten feet to his left. The two SUVs that constituted the guard shack were about twenty feet to his right. He could see the closer of the two SUVs plainly despite the darkness because of the small televisions that the guards were using to monitor the cameras. A faint blue glow emitted from the cab, just enough to allow him to see the outline of the vehicle. For perhaps the hundredth time since he'd started watching the townspeople's security measures, he wondered why, in the name of God, they had positioned those SUVs in front of the bridge's access ladder. Had they just not considered that someone would do what he had just done? Or had they maybe run out of the power or coaxial cables that connected the two ends of the bridge? If that were the case, Skip would have moved the SUVs on the far end backward instead of moving the Garden Hill ones forward. Whatever the reason, this lapse served to convince Skip that he had a decent chance of convincing them that they needed him.

  He looked at the outline of the SUV for a minute, trying to catch a glimpse of the people inside. Though he knew that they would not be able to see him even if they were staring right at the spot where he emerged, he wanted to make sure that one of them was not off taking a leak or something and that he didn't accidentally blunder in to him or her as he made his getaway. As his eyes adjusted to the dimness his brain finally began to make some sense out of the blurry shadows within the vehicle. He identified one human head in the front seat, on the driver's side. The head was leaning back against the headrest, moving from side to side every now and then. On the passenger side, he saw nothing. Where was the other guard?

  The answer came a moment later when a second head popped upward right next to the first head. This second head had a lot of long hair, obviously designating it as belonging to a female. Skip began to suspect where that second head had just been. Surely he was mistaken though? Nobody would do that on guard duty, would they?

  They would. This became apparent a moment later when the two heads came together in
a passionate kiss. He could not make out much detail but it was obvious that the two guards' hands were rather busily stroking each other.

  "You have got to be fucking kidding me," Skip mumbled, shaking his head in disgusted wonder. What were these people thinking?

  Obviously it wasn't about security. After only a minute or so of kissing and groping, the female suddenly pulled away and began making motions that could only mean that she was removing her pants. Her head dropped from sight once she finished this process and the head of the male followed it down. Shortly after this the SUV began to rock back and forth, slowly at first and then gradually picking up speed.

  Skip had seen enough. No longer making any particular effort to be cautious, he swung his foot over the railing and hopped down to the roadway. With one last contemptuous glance at the rocking SUV, he began to walk along the roadway in the direction of town.

  The road climbed steeply upward from the bridge where it passed through a gap between two hills before curving back down into the town itself. Skip walked slowly along the shoulder, right where the pavement met the dirt, using the contrast between the two surfaces to keep him oriented in the darkness. He would step forward gingerly each time, carefully feeling with his foot before shifting his weight forward. His progress was slow and it took him nearly an hour to make it to the top of the hill.

  He followed the curve of the road and, once he was about halfway around it, he was able to see faint lights in front of and slightly below him. They were houses! The flickering softness of the light told him that the illumination he was seeing in the various windows was from fire, either oil-lamps or fireplaces. Fire! The very thought of that natural warmth thrilled him. He continued to walk, moving steadily closer, trying to get some sort of count of just how many buildings were lit up in the wealthy subdivision that he was looking at. A hundred? Maybe a few more? As incredible as that seemed, it was accurate. How many people were left in this town?

  His mind conjured up an image of the town as he remembered it from his many hunting trips in the area. The actual township itself was nothing more than a few gas stations, a motel, and some simple houses at the intersection of State Route 63, which he was now walking upon, and Interstate 80, which was about two miles in front of him. Until about ten years before, Garden Hill had been nothing more than an exit sign that people passed on their way up to Reno or the ski resorts, it's only purpose to serve as a chain installation point and to gobble up the money of travelers who stopped there for gas. And then the real estate developers had discovered it and bought up all of the land adjacent to the canyon, slapping down expensive subdivisions among the pine trees and advertising the town as "luxurious rural living". The yuppies from Sacramento had flocked there in droves, buying up the 200 to 300 thousand dollar homes long before they were even built. These subdivisions were of the sort that were called "gated communities", which meant that they had eight foot concrete walls around them to keep the riff-raff out. They had all been grouped together on the top of a series of hills near the rim of the canyon although, with the exception of the really expensive houses, none of them had any sort of view of the canyon. Across Route 63 from the houses was the inevitable strip mall; home to a grocery store, a Starbucks, a computer store, and an expensive hair salon.

  Looking at the lights now, Skip could see that they were only showing in the nearer of the subdivisions, the one closest to the bridge. He continued walking down the road, heading directly for it.

  As the road dropped down out of the hill, Skip lost sight of the lights once he was lower than the security wall that surrounded the houses. He continued walking, switching to the other side of the road until he felt he was adjacent to the wall. He then inched forward, through the mud that made up the shoulder, his hands outstretched before him. He touched wet, unyielding concrete with his fingertips. He stopped. It was time to put his plan in action.

  He jumped upward, his hands grasping the top of the wall and holding on. He swung his left foot upward and hooked it over the edge, using it to pull the rest of his body up. Once atop the wall he adjusted himself carefully until he was seated on it, facing into the subdivision. In front of him were two houses, both with the faint glow of firelight showing from within them. He could not see the inhabitants because the blinds were closed. The light did provide him with enough illumination to see that he was overlooking a street that paralleled the wall.

  He did not jump down. Though the wind and the rain were particularly biting from eight feet up, he withstood them, hoping that it wouldn't take too long for him to be discovered.

  It took nearly an hour; a length of time which both disgusted and encouraged him. What the hell was the Micker with these people? How could they be so smart about some things and so stupid about others? He should not have been allowed to climb that wall at all, let alone sit atop it long enough to develop hypothermia. Just as he was about to give up and simply go find someone to surrender to, he spotted a flashlight bobbing and weaving its way towards him from the far end of the street.

  "About goddamn time," he muttered, keeping a sharp eye on it as it approached. It moved slowly forward, switching from the wall side of the road to the house side with predictable regularity. It was obvious that the person holding the light did not really expect to find anything, that he or she was just going through the motions.

  It turned out to be a she, two of them actually. He could not make out what they looked like since they were standing behind the flashlight beam, but they were talking to each other loudly enough for him to hear their conversation long before they were close enough to see him.

  "She's such a bitch," one of them was saying. "I'm telling you. It's like she's happy about all this or something."

  "I'm sure she ain't missing her husband too much, that's for sure," the other one replied. "That old fart was able to bring in the money for her pretty well but he sure wouldn't have been much help now. I wonder what she would've done if he'd lived. How long you think it would've been before she sent him packing?"

  "Probably before the rain started," the first said, giggling a little.

  "You think it would've taken that long?" the other shot back, giggling as well.

  "Pathetic," Skip whispered to himself, watching the light grow closer and closer. Finally it swung directly over him, illuminating him for all the world to see. He waited for their surprised squeals, for the challenge, for the swinging of guns towards him. It didn't come. Apparently they were so involved in their conversation that they had not even noticed the fact that they had just spotlighted an armed man sitting on their wall right in front of them. They continued on by without pausing, the flashlight beam continuing to swing back and forth.

  Skip watched in amazement as they walked less than ten feet in front of him, continuing to talk about "that bitch". He saw, in the residual light that reflected back at them, that they were both wearing black rain slickers and carrying rifles, which were slung carelessly over their shoulders.

  "HEY!" he yelled loudly at their backs, unable to keep a tone of total exasperation from slipping through.

  Now the squeals came. They both sounded as if they had been goosed with a hot curling iron. They spun around quickly, spearing him with the flashlight beam. Another squeal followed when they actually saw him sitting there. They began to scramble for the guns on their backs. Skip, waiting patiently, raised his hands into the air in surrender.

  "Don't move!" the one with the flashlight yelled in a trembling voice.

  "I'm not," he said, keeping his hands up. "I've been waiting here for a goddamn hour. Why should I move now?"

  "Who the hell are you?" the other one demanded, her voice shaky.

  "I'm Skip," he said. "The man who could've killed you a long time ago if I had wanted to. Can I jump down onto this side?"

  "What?" they both said in unison.

  "Jump down," he told them. "I'd like you to take me to whoever is in charge of this town. I need to talk to them."

  This
seemed to cause an overload of some sort. Neither one of them answered.

  "Hello?" he said. "Are you still with me?"

  "How did you get up there?" one of them, the flashlight bearer, finally asked. "How did you get here?"

  "It was much easier than it should have been," he said. "So how about it? Are you gonna take me to your leader, or what?"

  They continued not to answer his question. Instead they stared up at him, keeping the light on him, doing nothing. He imagined that he looked rather frightful to them. He had not shaved or bathed in nearly two weeks now and his clothing was clotted with filth. "Where did you come from? What do you want?" one of them asked.

  "I came from across the bridge," he replied.

  "That's impossible," the flashlight holder said. "We have that bridge guarded."

  "Yeah," he said, "by a couple of guards that are more interested in getting in each other's pants than they are in protecting you from me."

  This threw them for another loop. He heard them hurriedly whispering back and forth to each other about who was stationed on bridge guard tonight. Laura and Steve? Could it be true? They had heard rumors about those two.

  "Excuse me?" Skip interrupted. "Do you think that maybe you can update your gossip a little bit later? I'm freezing my ass off up here and I'd kind of like to get down. I'd like to talk to whoever is in charge of this operation."

  "About what?"

  "About security," he said. "I've surrendered to you, okay? Now if I jump down there, are you gonna shoot me?"

  There was a pause. Finally: "No."

  "Good," he said. "Stand clear. I'm coming down. I'll keep my hands up."

  He pushed himself off of the wall and landed neatly on his feet on the sidewalk of the street below, his knees easily absorbing the shock. The two guards kept him in the beam of the flashlight the entire time. He kept his hands up in the air, his arms bent at the elbow.