The day after: An apocalyptic morning

by Jessy Cruise

  The townspeople, scared, angry, and feeling helpless, had taken a lot of their frustrations out on Skip. What, they demanded, was there to do about it then? Were they just supposed to sit and wait for the attack to come? Were they supposed to try to make the evacuation anyway? What? Skip had few answers for them and, even after the hours of debate and discussion, no course of action had been either suggested or voted upon. The only thing that had been pretty much unanimously agreed upon was that surrendering to Auburn was not an option. After hearing Anna and Jean's description of Auburn life firsthand, that line of possibility was permanently shut down. About the only thing Skip could do at the present time to make anyone feel better was what he was now doing - flying out under cover of darkness to make sure that the Auburn forces were not yet underway.

  "Coming up on 5800 feet," Skip told Jack now, as he rose straight into the night sky. All of the instruments were dimmed down, allowing only a soft red glow in the cockpit. "Turning to heading two-five-eight."

  "Right," Jack said, panning the FLIR forward. "Everything clear in front of you."

  "Off we go then," he said, adjusting his controls and slowly building up forward speed. "Let's hope we don't find anything."

  He flew the helicopter slowly, never exceeding thirty knots of airspeed and often stopping and hovering so that Jack could take a better look around the area. They did not strictly follow the Interstate as they normally would have on a flight to Auburn. Instead, at each mudfall or washout that they encountered, they made a wide circle, checking both north and south for large groups of men off in the woods.

  "Are you sure we'd be able to see them?" Jack asked at one point. "What if they hide themselves at night just in case we try to do what we're doing now?"

  "You'll see them if they're there," Skip told him. "There's no way in hell that they'd be able to conceal four hundred warm bodies without a trace of heat showing. Besides, it doesn't sound like they even know about the FLIR's capabilities. They stick strictly to a..." Skip paused, a thought suddenly occurring to him.

  "Strictly to a what?" Jack asked after a moment.

  "A daytime doctrine," Skip said slowly. "They march and fight only during the day. Only during the day."

  Jack, not following what Skip was getting at, simply nodded and went back to his examination of the screen. Skip however, suddenly had a lot to think about.

  In all, the first night recon mission of the area between Auburn and Garden Hill took nearly three hours and an entire tank of fuel. They checked every square mile of potential real estate between the outskirts of Auburn and the border of Garden Hill. Skip even made a few checks of the area south of the canyon, just on the off-chance that they might have a force approaching from that direction bent on a suicidal attack across the Garden Hill bridge. They saw nothing at all, not a single person, not even an animal.

  "This area is sterile," Skip said, stifling a yawn, as they neared home at the end of the flight.

  "So now we have at least ten days," Jack said.

  "Right," he agreed. "And starting tomorrow, the night flights will be a routine thing. We'll go out every evening at 9:00 PM and make another check."

  "You mean we're going to do this every night?" Jack asked with a groan. Though he loved flying in the helicopter almost as much as he loved having sex with his wives, the thought of spending three grueling hours every night peering through the FLIR scope was a bit much.

  "No," Skip said, shaking his head. "Now that we've completed a thorough search, we'll only have to check the narrow area that the Auburn troops could have potentially marched to during the previous day. That's not much more than a ten mile radius, or, right about the first mudfall east of Auburn on the Interstate."

  "Oh," Jack said, nodding. "I see."

  They reported in on the radio a minute later, making a point to let Christine and Paul, who were manning the radio, know about the negative status of their search. By the time the chopper touched down five minutes later, pretty much the entire town had been informed of the good news.

  Jessica was beyond feeling humiliation at what was being done to her, was beyond feeling shame or loathing or anything but tired resignation. She was naked on the couch, on her hands and knees, her ass sticking up into the air. She felt the greasy intrusion of three fingers being shoved in and out of her anus.

  "She does have a tight ass," said Sergeant Rosewood, who was naked and kneeling behind her. It was his fingers, lubed with Crisco shortening, that were currently invading her back door.

  "And it's a hoity-toity ass as well," said Sergeant Stinson, who was naked in the recliner next to the couch, Linda kneeling between his legs and slurping on his erect penis with her mouth. "She used to be president of the homeowners association you know."

  "I heard that," said Rosewood, who removed his fingers and used them to coat his turgid cock with a liberal amount of Crisco as well. "This is the bitch that ordered people to shoot at me and Doug when we tried to get into that town." Rosewood, who had moved up nicely in the ranks of the militia, was one of the hunters that had met Skip, Christine, and Jack in the woods and had been given life-sustaining food by them.

  "Yep," said Stinson. "She's the one all right. I had to tame her quite a bit when she first came here. She wanted to go the hard way, that's for sure."

  "She seems nice and tame now," Rosewood said, grabbing Jessica by the hips and putting his cock against her lubed asshole. With a quick thrust he was buried in the tightness of her back passage. Jessica didn't even grunt at the intrusion. She was used to it by now. Rosewood pushed and pulled in and out of her a few times, getting the feel of the pleasure her orifice could provide and then he began to slowly move, setting an unhurried pace.

  "Taming high society bitches is my specialty," Stinson said with a grin.

  Jessica endured the thrusting within her, feeling neither pain nor pleasure from it. It was simply a part of her life these days. She made no noise except when Rosewood seemed to expect some and then she gave him what she thought he wanted to hear. What was happening to her now was quickly becoming a common thing in Auburn - although Barnes did not approve of it. Gone were the days when men would get together and have a few beers with their buddies and shoot the shit. There were no more liquor stores or 7-11 stores to buy the beer in and the town's supply was accessed only for special occasions. Now when men socialized with each other, they gang-banged the host's wives. An actual system of etiquette had developed for such occasions - the primary rule being that the highest-ranking guest got to choose which wife he would fuck first. Luckily Stinson was somewhat of an odd-duck among the other men and he did not have very many friends. And he had no friends at all among Stu's people - who were notoriously cruel to their sexual partners (another rule of etiquette involved in such gatherings was that the host not object to any act that his guest decided to employ).

  "Nothing like a good blow-job after a hard day of training," Stinson said as he ran his fingers almost lovingly through Linda's hair. "Helps relieve the soreness from all that marching and shooting and crap."

  "No shit," said Rosewood as he dribbled a little more Crisco on his cock on each out-thrust. "It'd be nice if we had some beer or something to go with this, wouldn't it?"

  "It would," Stinson agreed sourly. "But Barnes and Bracken and the rest of those pricks have probably drank it all by now."

  "Yeah," said Rosewood, "those fuckers. One of my bitches works in the admin building and she told me that those pricks sit back at night and drink fucking scotch on the rocks. On the fucking rocks, can you believe that shit?"

  "I heard that too," Stinson said. "They say that Barnes has a motherfuckin freezer set up in there that don't do nothin' but make ice for his drinks. And he has a fridge that does nothin but keep his beer cold."

  "A cold beer," said Rosewood nostalgically, savoring that thought even more than he was savoring the sensation of his cock in Jessica's ass. "That would be God's fucking law that Barnes is always spouting about, wouldn't i
t? Didn't God say that Barnes has the right to iced booze and cold beer?"

  "I'm sure he fucking did," Stinson agreed with a hiss of disgust.

  They each enjoyed the sensations they were feeling for a moment in silence. Stinson directed Linda to suck a little harder while Rosewood began to thrust a little harder. Soon, not wanting to end their episode prematurely, they slowed down and struck up conversation once again.

  "So what's the word on when we move out?" Rosewood asked.

  "No firm date," Stinson told him. "But I think it'll be pretty soon. Covington is chomping at the fucking bit to get marching and he has Bracken's ear."

  "Fucking Covington," Rosewood said. "Why's he so fucking hot to walk all the way to Garden Hill anyway?"

  "He says it's for the bitches. According to him there's some prime poontang there."

  "We got enough fucking poon here. I'd just as soon leave those Garden Hill assholes alone and kick it."

  "And Barnes has got a hard-on for that helicopter," Stinson added. "He wants that thing and its pilot."

  "Why?" Rosewood said bitterly. "They're not fucking with us. Why should we fuck with them? Everything is cool here. We have bitches, we have enough food to last us until the sun comes out, and we have enough weapons, ammo, and men to defend ourselves. Life is good right now. What the fuck do we need to go to Garden Hill and possibly get shot for?"

  "Orders," said Stinson with a bitter shrug. "What can you do?"

  "Fucking orders," Rosewood said, giving an extra-hard thrust into Jessica's ass.

  Soon the talk ended and the serious thrusting began. While Stinson took the can of Crisco and lubed up Linda's ass for penetration, Rosewood began to pound in and out of Jessica's with a fever. Soon he stiffened up and she felt the familiar sensation of hot sperm shooting into her bowels. As was customary in such acts, she used her mouth to clean his cock off afterward and then submitted to a more conventional fuck in the missionary position. By the time he was done with her, Stinson was also done with Linda, having shot his load all over her face.

  "Go get yourselves cleaned up, girls," Stinson ordered as they stood, dripping and aching, from the furniture and the floor. "And then help your sister clean up that fucking bedroom."

  The both answered as they were expected and retreated to the nearest bathroom, leaving the two men to dress themselves and continue their gripe session.

  "So was that enjoyable?" Jessica asked Linda when they were alone. "Do you enjoy having him fuck you up the ass and then blast you on the face?"

  "Shut up," said Linda weakly as she dipped a washrag into a bucket of water and wiped her face. "I'll tell him what you're saying. I swear I will."

  "And what will that get you?" Jessica asked her. "He'll beat me a little bit and he'll still be fucking you up the ass tomorrow. Do you really think ratting me out helps you in any way? Do you really?"

  "Fuck you," Linda said. "You're a troublemaker."

  "Nobody ever fucked me up the ass in Garden Hill," Jessica said, taking a washrag of her own and wiping the greasy slime from her backside.

  "Well you're not in Garden Hill now, are you?"

  "No," Jessica said. "I'm not. And the reason I'm not is because I was just like you are. I've learned something from my mistakes. Can you learn anything?"

  "Get the fuck outta my face," Linda said.

  "Social climbing gets a woman nowhere in this town," Jessica said, careful to keep her voice low. "We're property here and they use us like property."

  "So what? That's the way things are."

  "But it doesn't have to be that way," she whispered.

  Something in the tone of her voice caught Linda's attention. "What do you mean?" she asked.

  "Think about it," Jessica said. "We have more than two thousand women in this town. Two thousand. In a few days there is only going to be about fifty men. That's a twenty to one ratio. Have you ever thought about just what that means?"

  "You'll be hanged for talking like this," Linda said fearfully. "Or even worse, you'll be burned."

  "Only if someone tells the men," Jessica said. "Whose side are you really on anyway, Linda? Do you like the way things are in this town, or are you just adapting to a reality?"

  "What?"

  "Be honest with yourself. You don't really like being used like some masturbatory device, do you?"

  "No," Linda said.

  Jessica smiled. "I've had this discussion with Cathy already. I've also had it with a few other women at the high school. Maybe its time that you and I had it. What do you say?"

  Linda thought for a long time. "You want to talk," she said at last, "then talk."

  "Nervous?" Paul asked Anna early the next morning as the helicopter once more lifted into the air, this time with Paul and Anna in the back of it.

  "I've never flown in one of these before," she said with a voice that was not quite steady. Her hands were holding tight to the door handle next to her as the chopper rattled and bounced its way through the take-off maneuver.

  "Don't worry," Paul assured her. "It used to scare that crap out of me as well. Human beings are just not meant to fly, you know?"

  "I know," she said, cracking the briefest of smiles.

  "But you're safe enough up here," Paul said. "Skip hardly ever crashes this thing."

  "Hardly ever?" she asked, trying to figure out if he was joking or not.

  "Hardly ever," Skip, who was listening in, confirmed with a straight face. "However, I'd advise you not to pull too hard on the handle you're holding on to. You probably don't want to open the door in flight, do you?"

  She looked at what she was grabbing and then jerked her hand away as if it had been hot, visions of tumbling to her death in her head.

  "It's okay," Jack assured her, hiding a smirk. "Really. You're in good hands."

  While Anna perspired and wrung her hands and while Paul found cold comfort in the fact that someone else was more fearful than he was for once, Skip headed at ninety knots for Cameron Park. Once there he banked right and followed the ribbon of Highway 50 to El Dorado Hills. When they got close, Jack patched in the radio headsets to the frequency of the portable radio they had dropped to the town five days before.

  "Coming up on the town," Skip announced as he decreased his altitude and airspeed. Ahead of him the hills that guarded the town and part of the township itself were visible. "They've more than likely spotted us by now. It looks like they've all hidden themselves again."

  "Copy," Paul replied. "Go into a hover just outside of weapons range of them and I'll give them a call on the radio."

  "Are you sure that these people really want to talk to us?" Anna asked nervously, not liking at all the term "weapons range" or the fact that they were hiding.

  "We'll find out in a minute, won't we?" Skip asked her, bleeding away the last of his forward speed. "We're hovering," he told Paul.

  "Right," Paul said, raising his hand to his key button. He pressed it. "El Dorado Hills, El Dorado Hills, this is Paul Terra aboard the Garden Hill helicopter. Anyone down there?"

  This time the response was almost immediate. "Good morning, Paul," said a male voice. "This is Pat. You're a few days earlier than we expected you. To what do we owe the honor of this visit?"

  "Sorry for dropping in unexpected," Paul said. "But we've had something of fundamental importance occur in our town and we thought that it might be a good idea to discuss it with you."

  "Please explain what you mean," Pat answered back after a moment.

  "We've had two women from Auburn find their way to our town," Paul explained. "They had quite a shocking tale to tell about life there. It seems that what we discussed the other day about our suspicions towards that town were actually somewhat naïve compared to the truth. They are in fact a very militaristic society that makes a habit of attacking other groups of survivors for their supplies."

  There was a longer pause this time. "I understand," Pat said at last. "Do you wish another face to face meeting today? We are agreeable t
o that down here."

  "We do," Paul said. "We have brought one of the women from Auburn with us as well."

  "Very well," Pat told them. "I'll send a truck to go pick you up at the location of your choice."

  "Copy that," Paul said. "Let me talk to Skip and I'll advise you where that will be in a moment." He turned to Skip. "So how about it? You trust them enough to drop us in the same place as before?"

  "I think," Skip said slowly, almost agonizingly, "that we're going to have to learn to trust these guys even more than that. And they're going to have to learn to trust us. What do you say we take this trust a giant leap forward right now?"

  "What do you mean?"

  "Why don't we ask them if we can land in the town?"

  Paul looked at him wide-eyed. "Are you serious?"

  "What've we got to lose?" Skip asked. "At worst they'll capture us and have the chopper for their own. At best, we'll prove to each other that we're on the up and up. A radical experiment, true, but at this point we're running out of time to coddle this potential alliance along. If there's any help for our situation to be had here, we need to find out quickly."

  Paul continued to look at him, trying to calmly evaluate what Skip was suggesting and having a hard time at it. In the end, he was forced to simply go with a gut feeling. "I think they're on the up and up," he said at last. "Let's ask."

  Skip nodded, having his own mix of emotions about the decision.

  Paul keyed up the microphone. "Pat, are you still there?"

  "Right here, Paul," he answered. "I have a team standing by in the truck. Where will it be?"

  "Well actually," he said, "we were wondering if maybe you would allow us to land in the town."

  The pause was about ten seconds this time. "I'm sorry," Pat said. "Did you say you wanted to land in the town?"

  "If you'll allow it," Paul replied. "We promise we don't have an attack force on board."

  Another long silence. Finally: "Will the parking lot outside of the elementary school be sufficient?"

  Skip touched down gently less than a hundred feet away from the cafeteria building. With hands that were trembling a little from nervous anticipation, he went through the power-down procedure and turned off the engine, allowing the rotor to slowly spin to a halt. "Well now," he said, watching as two men and three women, all of them carrying rifles, came out of the building, "I guess we find out if we just made a big mistake or not, don't we?"