Children of the After: The Complete Series

by Jeremy Laszlo

  Lifting the bottle to his lips, he savored the both cooling and burning sensation the carbonated liquid had upon his mouth and throat. Taking several big gulps, it felt as if he could actually feel layers of ash and grime he had been breathing all day get stripped away as he drank.

  With little to no conversation, all three sat around their collection of supplies for a while, each daydreaming about whatever memories these flavors recalled unto each of them before they decided it was time for sleep. Waiting until both his big brother and sister were upon their cardboard beds, Will switched off his light which each of them had taken turns shaking over the last few hours. It wasn’t long before dreams of candy stores and cakes drifted him off to a deep restful sleep.

  Chapter Seven

  Jack awoke stiff but refreshed, and looking about his surroundings he found Sam already awake, quietly shaking Will’s light while sitting upon one of the shelving units with her back against the wall. It was apparent she had been awake for some time, as she had somehow managed to apply her makeup, which although was becoming more acceptable prior to the event, still detracted from her natural features too much for his own taste. He didn’t know whether her style was considered punk or goth or some other form of leather-clad trend that he didn’t have a name for, but it was who she identified with and as such he did not usually weigh in with his own opinions. The key word being ‘usually’.

  “So… you’re up awfully early, crow,” he mocked her, with a reference to the nineties movie starring Brandon Lee.

  “Har har. Your originality is stunning,” she retorted. “So… jerk, what is the plan for today?”

  “Keep walking, but this time we check for supplies along the way.”

  “Still heading to Grandma’s, then?”

  “Why? Do you think we should go somewhere else?”

  “I don’t know,” Sam admitted. “I just really don’t want to see it like the rest of the city. I mean, that’s where we have had every Christmas and Thanksgiving for my whole life. I just don’t want to have that memory ruined for me. For Will either.”

  “I know. Me too. But without any more information, I just don’t know where else to go. I had thought about heading over to the Great Lakes, but if there were any military still in the area, I think the city would be crawling with them. You know?”

  “Yeah, at least a helicopter or something.”

  They sat in silence for a few moments and Jack couldn’t help but let his mind wander. The lack of any sign of a human presence bothered him to no end. Questions swirled in his mind that he had no answers for. He feared the answers. They had gone a whole day without a single sign of life in the huge city. They had walked miles and miles and found nothing. Not one thing.

  “Do you think there is anyone else left?” he asked his sister.

  “I don’t know. There has to be, right? I mean… billions… to just us? It just doesn’t seem possible.”

  “I know. But we haven’t seen a thing.”

  “We kind of have, though. All this stuff is gone, right? All the food in the apartments had to of been taken after whatever happened.”

  “But what if it wasn’t just an event? What if the event triggered a disease, or a disease triggered the event and everyone just died?” Jack wondered aloud.

  “I don’t think so, if they had, then where did they go?”

  “I don’t know, Sam. I thought of that too, but nothing makes any sense. I just can’t make it work out in my head. Nothing adds up.”

  “What if there were bodies everywhere, but someone cleaned them up?” Sam asked, her voice sounding more hopeful.

  “You mean like after whatever happened here they came in, cleared the city, and declared it uninhabitable or something and that’s why there aren’t any people or anything?”

  “Yeah, like Hiroshima. Wasn’t there a power plant on the edge of Lake Michigan? Was it nuclear?” Sam asked.

  “I don’t know. I’m really starting to wish I paid more attention in school. I’m thinking you might be close, but that still doesn’t explain some things.”

  “Like what?”

  “The food missing from the apartments and even here, but more than that, why aren’t there any planes in the sky? Not one. There used to be planes everywhere.”

  “Yeah, but there used to be airports in Chicago, maybe they don’t have a reason to come here anymore.”

  “Yeah, I guess. It just seems too weird,” Jack concluded.

  After their chat they both drifted off again into their own thoughts until Will began to squirm around, signaling that he would be awake in the very near future. Without a whole lot of selection to choose from, Jack rose from his cardboard bed and poured the three remaining packs of Twinkies out of the box, and into his lap. Deciding he didn’t want to wait for Will to wake up gradually, he shook his younger brother’s shoulder gently and when he awoke he handed him a sugar and caffeine laden Pepsi to get the day started. That should certainly put some pep in his step.

  After a hasty breakfast they removed the barricade from the door, and made their way back out into the street. It was time to search for some more supplies. Crossing the road they entered another gas station, but found the only cooler it contained had been destroyed and had no lingering supplies. Minutes later, however, they entered the third gas station inhabiting the intersection and once inside they managed to find a snack-sized bag of chips along with a candy bar and two more bottles of soda. Then it was back to the streets.

  For most of the morning their journey led them down the center of the same road, mile after mile, occasionally ducking into the wreckage of one building or another to scavenge for supplies, usually turning up empty. When afternoon came, and the sun beamed down upon them from between wispy clouds Sam froze in her steps, causing both him and Will to stop as well. Turning to look at her, Jack opened his mouth as she gave him a look that would have turned a rampaging bear away. Watching as she raised a finger to her lips, it was Will who perked up next, turning his head this way and that as if seeking something out. It was only a second or two more when he heard it for the first time. There was a sound in the city.

  * * * * *

  Sam froze in her tracks, certain she had heard something besides her own breathing and the rhythmic crunching of glass beneath their feet. Turning her head this way and that to look both up and down the road, she heard it again as Jack turned to look at her. He had the audacity to open his mouth, though she quickly silenced him with a look. Straining her senses, she heard it again, and turning her head she was now certain.

  Somewhere in the distance ahead, perhaps around a corner or a few blocks away, something or someone else was moving among the streets. They could all hear it now, but it was Jack who made the first move.

  Her shoulder grasped by one of his large hands, Jack led her to duck as they moved quickly to the side of the road in the shadow of a building’s ruins. All around them the sparkling blackened wasteland stood as if frozen in death, but ahead they could hear the sound growing. Waiting several moments she was able to slow her breathing and listen, as they all did, angling their heads and necks to pick up the sounds. The longer they waited the more distinct the sounds became, and Sam knew that something was moving.

  In pairs the crunches came in rapid succession, sort of like a beating heart, but it was accompanied by a growling and grinding sound that raised the hairs on the back of her neck and arms. Whatever it was, it was big. Just when she thought she had located the direction of the sound, another heart-like beat hammered through the crushed glass of a nearby road at a much faster rhythm, moving from a different direction as if to intercept the first and then, like all the sounds had begun, they went silent.

  “I think we should check it out,” Jack whispered, causing her to jump.

  “We don’t know what it is,” Sam said, fear welling up in her stomach.

  “Exactly. We need to know what is out here. We need to know what happened. You guys want to know, right?” Jack repli
ed.

  Sam nodded in reply and noted that Will did as well. Letting Jack take the lead, she reached out and took Will’s hand as they moved slowly across the crumbling face of the building beside them. Reaching the next corner they cautiously looked out in all directions, before turning right down the narrow intersecting street in the direction of the now absent sounds. It was two blocks in the new direction before they heard another sound, though it did not have the same rhythm as the previous. Even so, they used it to again change direction, turning left, back in the original direction they had been traveling for the majority of the day.

  Painstakingly slow they crept along, and Sam silently cursed every crunch of glass beneath her feet. Moving amongst the shadows of the buildings, it was two more blocks when Jack stopped abruptly. Then, unexpectedly, a voice sounded from somewhere ahead, and looking back at her, Jack pointed to the intersection just a dozen or more yards ahead and they began to move once more, only more slowly and more carefully than before. With each step she could hear the voice more clearly, though it was faint and she couldn’t make out the words, but it was a voice. The implications were astronomical. They weren’t the only people alive anymore. And then the voice yelled.

  Still she had not understood the words it yelled, but the rhythmic thrumming of glass and asphalt sounded once more, only for a second or two and then both the yelling and the pounding stopped. Had whatever made the growl-like sound attacked the man? Shivers lanced down her spine.

  Step after tedious step they crept to the corner, and Jack peered around it cautiously before waving for each of them to join him. Peeking around the corner with her brothers, Sam saw something she had not expected at all. There, perhaps three and a half blocks further down the road to their left sat a man on horseback. He wore an odd hat and a long duster jacket like in western movies, and behind him was another horse and wagon, guided by yet another man dressed similarly. Though their words could not be heard from here, it was plain enough to see that they were talking, and seconds later they began to advance down the street towards Sam and her brothers.

  Watching their slow advance, Sam labeled each of the strange sounds they had heard before. The beating hearts were the horses’ hooves upon the ground and the growling or grinding sound was the cart’s wooden wheels cutting a trail through the glass shards upon the road. People. People and horses. Not everyone was dead.

  Watching further, the man on horseback turned a corner, steering away from her concealed location, and Sam watched as the horse-drawn cart disappeared around the corner behind him.

  “Well, that answers a lot of questions,” Jack said, sighing loudly.

  “Yeah, but raises a lot of new ones. Do you think we should approach them, maybe at least ask them what happened?”

  “Let’s go talk to them,” said Will, weighing in with his own opinion.

  “I don’t think so,” Jack objected. “Not yet. What if they did this?” he added, gesturing to the buildings around him. “We still don’t know anything. They could be dangerous.”

  “Yeah, but they could also be a lot of help if they aren’t dangerous,” Sam argued.

  “Yeah,” Will agreed.

  “Guys, I’m sorry, but Dad said to keep you safe, and that’s what I’m doing.”

  And that was the end of it, at least that’s what Sam thought before something caught her attention, or rather the lack thereof. The sound of the man on horseback and cart had stopped again.

  Lifting her gaze from Jack to the road beyond, the air caught in her chest as she locked eyes with the man on horseback just a block down the street. Without the ability to warn her brothers, her heart began hammering in her chest as the rider drove his heels to the beast’s flanks and began thundering towards them. Finally her control over the air in her lungs was restored but all she could manage was a scream, but Jack had already turned around as the rider thundered towards them.

  “Run!” Jack shouted as Sam took heed of his words and began down the road the way they had come, half dragging Will with her.

  The thundering of hooves grew louder and louder, and briefly Sam wondered how it could be that her track star brother remained behind her and Will when it occurred to her that he wasn’t with them at all. He had stopped to buy them time and in doing so, protect them.

  * * * * *

  Will raced along as fast as his little legs would carry him, pumping out a steady rhythm as his feet slipped atop the broken shards of glass beneath him. Moving as fast as he could, Sam tugged at his arm tirelessly, dragging him to speeds that were unobtainable on his own. Behind them the man on a horse thundered towards them, seemingly with malice in his heart as he gained on Will and his siblings.

  One block and then another they ran, when Sam looked back over her shoulder, not at him, but beyond, as her face contorted in fear. Will stopped, dragging Sam to a stop with him, as he spun to look back the way they had come. His eyes going wide, his heart dropped into the pit of his stomach as his airway closed. Barely jogging a block behind, Jack had all but stopped as the man upon the horse was right on top of him.

  Faster than Will could even process, the man on the horse reached down as he thundered past and grabbed ahold of Jack’s collar, dragging him along with the horse as he slowed the beast to a stop. Reaching up towards his neck, the collar choking him, Jack thrashed his legs about, pulled off his feet by the man in the saddle.

  Will felt himself hiccup. He still wasn’t breathing. It was an attack. Sam screamed, and everything went black.

  Unsure how much time had passed, though it felt like little more than a blink of an eye, Will’s sight and hearing was restored. Pulling himself up to a seated position, all was just as it had been before, except Sam was no longer holding his hand. Then he saw her.

  Will witnessed in that moment when, like a crazed animal, Sam raced back down the street the way they had run, screaming, with a length of charred pipe in her hands. Fighting to focus as the edges of his vision went black again, Will watched as Sam lunged towards the man whose bearded face was much obscured by the shadow of his hat. In defense, the man leaned away from the blow meant for his head. Sam missed, but it didn’t matter.

  As she struck the man’s shoulder in a glancing blow, he released Jack’s sweatshirt as the pipe was driven downwards with all Sam’s weight into the neck of the harmless beast that carried the attacker. Frightened by the blow, the beast spooked and reared up on its hind legs, kicking and neighing, spilling the man from his saddle. Smashing to the ground, the man’s head bounced as shards of glass scattered around him. Like a bullet, the beast rocketed off down the narrow street, its rider still entangled in the stirrups as he was dragged away at an alarming pace through the river of shattered glass and rubble. Just a foot away from Will the beast and fallen rider passed, spraying up shards of glass in all directions in their wake, but Will had no energy to move away as his vision failed again. The last thing he saw was Jack regaining his feet with a stricken look of panic on his face, as a strange shadow seemed to detach itself from the wall and slink across the street. Then the world went black.

  Chapter Eight

  Jack didn’t know how much time they had until the man who pulled the wagon appeared to avenge his friend, but it didn’t matter. Nothing did. Except Will. Clutching his younger brother’s limp body in his hands he shook him vigorously, trying to get any sign of life out of him as tears streamed down his own face.

  “Breath, baby! C’mon, pumpkin, breathe for Sam!” Sam shouted over and over beside him as he fumbled with the cap to the inhaler.

  It was an old thing, having been stored for months in the medicine cabinet even before the day they were closed in the vault. Jack assumed it was more than a year old at this point and hoped that somehow it would still work. Laying Will’s head down upon his back he let it fall back, opening his airway, and he pressed the mouthpiece of the inhaler to his brother’s now blue lips. Forcing his mouth closed around the inhaler, he pressed down on the canister of medicine a
nd struck Will hard in the chest with the open palm of his hand and waited. Nothing.

  On and on Sam wailed, begging the little boy to breathe but he refused to stir. Again Jack pressed down on the canister and this time he pulled Will’s face up and breathed into this mouth, pinching off his nose. He had never done CPR. Never even been taught, but he’d seen it on TV enough to have a basic idea of the concepts involved, and he employed them now as best as he could.

  Forcing another breath into Will’s lungs and then another, he paused and watched and waited. He still had a pulse but made no sign of improvement. Sam continued to scream at him. She’d reached some point beyond an emotional threshold he couldn’t afford to reach himself. Leaning down he breathed again into Will’s lungs. Watching for any sign from his little brother, his own breath stopped when Will twitched. Then, like a huge weight was lifted off the little boy’s chest, he heaved in a deep breath, coughing and sputtering as Jack pulled him up and clutched him to himself before Sam collapsed into them as well. There was no time. They needed to move.

  Rising with Will in his arms, knowing full well he couldn’t be expected to run, Jack ran for him, carrying his brother as fast as he was able to get away from possible pursuit. Sam followed behind him, but he dared not slow enough to look back. Racing back to the street their own home had been located on, he turned back in their original direction and ran. And continued to run for what felt like hours.