Primal Shift: Volume 1 (A Post Apocalyptic Thriller)

by Griffin Hayes

  “Where’s your weapon, Dale?” Lou asked, in the harsh tone of a drill sergeant.

  Dale turned back and pointed over the counter. “It fell.”

  At first, the sound of angry shouting in the distance didn’t register in Finn’s ears. The accidental discharge of Dale’s weapon had taken care of that. “You hear something?” Finn asked.

  The others shook their heads. Tanner had a finger in his ear and was shaking it back and forth like he expected his brain to come tumbling out.

  Finn stepped out into the hall and froze. A golf cart packed with armed men was approaching fast. And as it did, one disturbing thought kept echoing through every corner of Finn’s mind: Now the bastards know how to drive.

  Larry Nowak

  Rainbowland, UT

  The shrill scream pierced the air again, and Larry knew there was no mistaking it. The camp was under attack. The first to scatter were those in the crowd who had gathered around to witness the bizarre ritual of his induction into the cult. Most of them were ordinary, everyday people, thrown together by circumstance. A few of the lucky ones had family members with them who had been unaffected by The Shift.

  Clad in a sopping-wet linen robe, Larry’s body was a quivering mess of cold and nerves. He was still breathing heavily from All Father’s attempt to teach him an important lesson in who was really the one in charge here.

  He’d nearly died a few moments ago and judging by the chaos now engulfing the compound, death still might not be far away.

  Larry stumbled past tents filled with terrified faces staring back at him. All Father himself was nowhere to be seen and might as well have been a corpse for all Larry cared right now. It was only as he emerged from the narrow streets of Tent City that he understood the scale of the mayhem.

  A group of men in ragged clothes – men who from here looked a hell of a lot like hobos – were attacking anyone in sight. Their weapons were primitive but devastating: hammers, bats, spears, presumably anything and everything they could get their hands on. One guy, wearing a lumberjack shirt, was even swinging a stainless steel rolling pin as though he were chasing a child for stealing from his kitchen. The bodies of two cult members lay unmoving on the ground, blood pouring from their crushed skulls.

  Simone, a woman he’d met only yesterday, was being dragged past him by her feet, and through the dusty streets of Rainbowland. She screamed for help, her arms outstretched, and all Larry needed to do to help her was reach out and take her hand, but the thought never occurred to him. She was dead, as far as he was concerned. His own life was far more valuable, and he sought to preserve it for as long as he could.

  Gun shots rang out.

  A group of men dressed in leather was coming up between the trailers, kicking in each of the doors and forcibly pulling people out by their hair. Behind them was a school bus, and they threw a handful of the captives onboard. But they weren’t taking everyone. The men in black leather were letting some go, and Larry had the strange sensation he was watching someone shopping in a grocery store. The crack of another shot snapped him back to reality, and he ran for the compound. Barely 30 feet away was the door to the main entrance. Still wearing his soaking-wet ceremonial dress, Larry hurried across the street as fast as his numb and trembling legs could carry him.

  The yellow school bus was getting closer and so, too, were the men collecting prisoners. They had finished with the trailers, and now they were shooting into the air, trying to drive others out of hiding. Breathless, Larry reached the door, turned the handle, and discovered, to his horror, that it was locked.

  Oh, you’ve got to be shitting me.

  His blood ran as cold as the shivering flesh on his body.

  Just then he heard a voice on his left.

  “Nice dress, Asshole.”

  He turned and saw a small man with a pockmarked face and slicked back hair. He looked like the sort of thug Larry might have known from the old days, running petty scams on Chicago’s means streets. A beady-eyed little bastard, wearing a shit-eating grin; Larry’s heart sank because he knew now he was about to die. He’d come all this way, worked so hard to make something of himself, the way he’d made something of himself in the financial capital of the world, and all of it would be for nothing.

  “I said, ‘Nice dress,’” the thug said. The men on either side of him giggled along, as though this were the funniest fucking joke they’d heard all day. In the bus behind them, Larry saw another guy, shoving people into cages.

  What are these sick bastards gonna do with them?

  The pock-faced man leveled his weapon at Larry and pulled back the hammer. It made a dry click as it locked into place.

  “Wait,” Larry said. The scene was a strange one, because all around them were the sounds of murder and insanity as the savages attacked anyone in sight.

  “So you do talk.” He wagged the barrel of his gun back and forth like a disapproving finger.

  Larry nodded, for a moment utterly speechless.

  “Then I’m guessing you’re the hippy son of a bitch who runs this place.”

  Larry shook his head no. The man with the slicked back hair aimed his pistol back at Larry’s head. “Then you ain’t much good to me.”

  “I’m not the leader,” Larry stammered. “But I can help you find him.”

  Finn, Carole, Lou, Dale, and Tanner

  Salt Lake City International Airport, UT

  The cart came barreling down on them as Finn raised his shotgun, jerking the top handle back to chamber a shell. The others ran out to see what was coming. Carole gasped. Finn didn’t have time to get off more than a single shot before he ducked a board, bristling with three-inch nails, being swung by one of the men in the passing cart. Finn’s shot went wide, and the group retreated back toward Popeyes. The figures crammed onto the cart weren’t only men. Finn was sure he spotted at least one female in there, although all of them wore torn, dirty clothing, their faces painted with long, bloody streaks. If he hadn’t thought of them as savages before, he certainly did now.

  “Jesus H.,” Lou cried. “Who taught these sonsabitches to drive?”

  Finn poked his head back into the corridor.

  “They’re turning around.”

  “We’ve got guns,” Dale said. “Why don’t we just shoot them?”

  “If case you forgot,” Lou snapped. “You dropped your gun in a pile of rats. And we don’t have nearly enough bullets to shoot this place up.”

  “Lou’s right,” Carole said. “We can’t stay here.”

  Finn waved them forward. “If we can make it back past the security check point, they might not be able to follow us.”

  The cart was having trouble turning around. The Wipers may have relearned the basic principles of steering and pushing pedals, but they sure as hell weren’t good at it yet.

  Finn was about to tell them to run when Dale tore right past him. The rest were close behind, and they could hear the Wipers in the cart yipping and hollering.

  When Carole turned around, she saw the cart giving chase. Suddenly, the blood drained from her face when she recognized the man driving it. It was Mechanic’s Overalls and from the way the distant features of his face were set, she was sure he recognized her, too.

  Lou stopped, dropped down on one knee, leveled his Hello Kitty AR-15 and began squeezing off rounds. Sparks ricocheted off the front of the cart. One of the headlights shattered, and then a man wielding a knife tumbled, his limp body flopping out of the cart and over the seats in Gate B1. Lou wasn’t going to get them all, probably wouldn’t even stop the cart, and Finn knew it, which is why he skidded to a stop and charged back to grab Lou.

  The cart was less than 20 feet away when Finn reached him. Lou’s rifle was jammed, and he was working the slide back and forth to clear it. Racking his Mossberg Chainsaw, Finn waited until the Wipers were about three yards away before he opened up. There had to be nearly a dozen of them packed on board, like a bus in some poor Third World country. Finn’s first shot hit a
fat man holding a frying pan square in the chest, knocking him back into the others. A weak cry rang out as the he struck the floor. The cart ground to a halt, and the others scrambled off and charged, swinging crudely made weapons in the air with a bloodlust Finn hadn’t seen, even in the Vegas grocery store. More shots roared from his shotgun, cutting down three men before he racked again. When he pulled the trigger this time, all he heard was a click. Lou’s Hello Kitty was still jammed, and both of them turned on their heels and ran.

  The others were up ahead, nearing the intersection, when Finn saw another cart come out of nowhere and run right into Dale, his body immediately pulled under and spat out the back end as the tires rolled over him. Carole was fiddling with her gun, trying to remove the safety. She didn’t know what she was doing. But Tanner did. Not much more than a scared kid, he brought his hunting rifle to his shoulder and fired into the packed cart. The powerful bullet went through two men, killing them instantly. He worked the bolt and aimed again, but by that time, the cart was already gone.

  Carole glanced back and saw Finn and Lou running toward them with about a dozen Wipers hot on their heels. One of them threw a makeshift spear – a broom handle with a kitchen knife lashed to the end – and it sailed past Lou’s right shoulder.

  Carole had been trying to fire the Walther with the safety on. She flicked it off now and squared the sights on the group bearing down on Lou and Finn. Tanner did the same and when the angle was right, they both opened fire. Bullets whizzed past Finn’s ears, thudding into the men behind him. Finn swung around, brandishing his shotgun like a club, and started swinging madly. Lou was right there beside him, parrying a thrust from a machete and sending the butt of his rifle into the gut of an Asian guy with spiky hair.

  An East Indian in a ratty blue TSA uniform, who must have been pushing 50, raised a bat in the air, intent on using it to crack Finn’s head wide open. A pistol shot made the man’s eyes go wide, and a thin trickle of blood ran from the newly formed hole in his throat. He collapsed to the ground, clutching his throat and making horrible noises. The three who were left: A woman, a man in a cook’s uniform, and Mechanic’s Overalls, turned and fled.

  Finn’s face was covered in blood, and he wiped it away with the sleeve of his overalls.

  “I didn’t think you knew how to use a gun,” he said to Carole.

  She engaged the Walther’s safety. “There’s a lot about me you don’t know.”

  In the distance, Tanner was calling them over.

  When they arrived, he was kneeling by an unconscious Dale.

  “He dead?” Lou asked.

  Tanner looked up, not entirely able to hide the fear on his face. “He’s breathing.”

  From far away came a boom.

  To Finn’s ears, it sounded like those idiot Wipers had driven their cart into a wall.

  “They may drive like a bunch of yahoos,” Finn said, “but we gotta get Dale out of here.”

  “What about Aiden?” Carole cried.

  Lou and Finn both put one of Dale’s arms around their neck. “Right now we don’t have a choice. We’ll come back with reinforcements.” Finn was staring straight into Carole’s eyes, and the agony he saw was breaking his heart.

  “I have your word?” she demanded.

  Finn didn’t hesitate. “If Aiden’s alive, we’ll find him.”

  Dana Hatfield

  Rainbowland, UT

  When the shit hit the fan, Dana and her father were nestled in the crowd who was watching, with some amusement, as Larry was dunked into a metal bathtub. His legs thrashing about had made it clear enough that something was wrong. Like maybe All Father’s men were drowning him, and Dana began to shuffle through the crowd, to put a stop to it, when they finally pulled him up. The screaming started then. The fact that it came from somewhere near the main cult compound, a vantage point from which Larry’s struggle would surely not have been visible, told Dana something else was going on. Something very bad.

  Shoving through the assembled mass of people, Dana reached the edge of Tent City and a saw a group of men with primitive weapons, dressed in ratty clothing, club a young male cult member to death.

  Her hand went instinctively to the band at the back of her pants, patting there more than once without finding the bulky metal shape of her gun.

  The realization that she’d left it in the tent made the breath catch in her throat. Racing back through Tent City, she called out to anyone who would listen. “We’re under attack. We’re under attack.”

  Already people were on edge after the piercing scream had signaled that something was off. Dana’s announcement of an attack sent panic surging through the crowd. There couldn’t have been more than a hundred of them, but she knew that being packed into such a narrow space as they were was a recipe for disaster. The warning sent them scrambling in every direction. Dana was punched and kicked nearly a dozen times as she fought to reach her father. She found him on the ground, dazed. In the mad rush, he’d been knocked over and nearly trampled. She reached down and helped him to his feet.

  “Dana, what’s happening?” He was still wearing the same beige Dockers and navy button-down he wore every day, except now his clothes were smeared with grease and mud and torn at the seams. The end of the world had taken a toll on more than his clothes, and not only because he was pushing 60, but mostly because he’d stopped hitting the booze. For an alcoholic, cold turkey can be just as terrifying as facing an apocalypse. With his hands still trembling, from the withdrawal as well as from the fall, Dana did her best to help him along. She slid one of his arms around the back of her neck and led him to her tent, dodging and weaving through the stampede of terrified people.

  They had nothing to defend themselves with. She flipped the mattress on her cot and there, laying on the springs, was her SIG. That it only had a single 12-round magazine wasn’t first and foremost on her mind. There were other bullets at the bottom of her rucksack, but there wasn’t any time to go fishing around for them. After already losing her father once, she wasn’t going to let it happen again.

  After exiting the tent, they cut through the narrow lanes between dark canvas walls. At the back was Dana’s father, breathing hard and doing his best to keep up. In the lead was Dana with the SIG in her hand, safety off, a round chambered and ready for business.

  She emerged on the north side of Tent City, between where the latrines had been set up and the parking lot, filled with the cars refugees had scratched together to make the journey to Rainbowland. Running between them were more men with machetes and baseball bats spiked with nails, swinging at anything that moved. One of those moving objects was a tall thin figure, dressed in purple. It was All Father. Two of the savages were bearing down on him, and it was clear he wasn’t going to outrun them. An unexpected dip in the terrain sent All Father crashing to the ground. The brutes stopped, planted their feet and raised their weapons to finish him off. Two crisp shots rang out from Dana’s SIG. Even grasped with both her hands, the kick was noticeable, and she hoped her aim was true. One .40-caliber bullet struck the first attacker in the temple, his body hitting the ground like a child’s doll. The second slammed the other man in the chest, and he released the bat and sank to his knees.

  A push from behind knocked Dana down and she fell, arms outstretched, the SIG, skidding a few feet from her grasp. She rolled onto her back and saw a guy in ragged city worker’s clothes, holding a hammer. Her father charged the man, but was easily thrown back against one of the canvas tents. The city worker was on top of her a second later. He smacked the side of her head with his fist, dazing her. It was clear soon enough that his intention wasn’t to kill her right away. He was struggling to keep her subdued and remove her pants. He was trying to rape her, and if there was one thing Dana knew, it was that she wasn’t going to let this son of a bitch touch her. Frustrated that she was fighting back, he swung the hammer, narrowly missing her head. Perhaps realizing he wasn’t having much luck, he then changed his plan from rape to plain o
ld murder. He outweighed her by at least 50 pounds, and Dana knew it was a losing battle, that his hammer would eventually connect and she would be dead.

  Three shots cut through the air, turning the city worker’s face into a red pulp. He fell backward, dead before he hit the ground.

  Getting to her feet, Dana saw her father struggling to stand and understood that he hadn’t been the one to save her.

  The gun dropped from All Father’s hands as he stared at her with disbelief at what he’d just done.

  “We need to get to the safety of the main house,” she told him. Her father was beside her, grasping the dead man’s hammer. She reached out. “All Father, you need to come with us.”

  When he didn’t respond, she took him by the arm.

  The three of them were passing between the rows of parked cars when she spotted Larry, surrounded by men dressed in black leather. One of them was pointing a gun at Larry’s face. Larry glanced over, and for a moment she swore their eyes met and that she was witnessing the final moments of his life, but then she saw it wasn’t her he was watching. It was All Father, and soon Larry was pointing over at them, drawing the attention of the men with the guns.

  Then she was struck by something else, and it sent a jolt through every nerve ending in her body. The man pointing the pistol at Larry’s face, she knew him, knew him quite well. Had prayed she would never see his pockmarked face or slicked hair ever again. It was Jeffereys, the slave trader, and she didn’t need a diagram to understand why he’d come. The bastard was out to fill more basements with helpless victims. She raised her SIG and fired repeatedly until her gun clicked empty. Larry covered his face and ran as the man next to Jeffereys dropped dead with a hole in his head. Another leather-clad slaver was hit in the chest and tried to make it into the bus behind them before he went face-first into the gravel road. The bullet she’d intended for Jeffereys’ heart cut through his hip instead, and he crumpled, clutching the wound. The other men returned fire at once, spraying Dana, Peter, and her father with glass as the windshields around them shattered into tiny fragments. Her pistol now empty, Dana knew they needed to get away and fast. The cars offered at least some cover as the group hurried toward the building. Her only hope was that the slavers didn’t know she was empty, otherwise there would be nothing to hold them back. After running around the rear side of the main building, Dana saw the gymnasium door was still open. They rushed inside and slammed the stout metal doors shut behind them.