by Summer Lane
“Why would they all leave?” I say softly.
Chris shakes his head.
He doesn’t know.
We fan out around the camp, searching through the small roads and rushing through cabins. No one. I am desperately afraid and confused. There is no sign of an attack. Why would everyone leave? What happened to Manny and Elle and Arlene and Bravo? What happened to Margaret Young and Isabel?
I turn onto the main road and head toward Staff Housing, a cul-de-sac of cabins. I see the Young Family Cabin. The green shutters are frozen shut. I climb the deck, my boots echoing on the wood. I touch the brass handle of the front door.
It is unlocked.
I open the door and step inside. It is freezing in the living room. The fireplace smells like it was burning no more than a day or two ago. Closets are open. Objects are strewn across the floor. I can see that the Youngs left in a panic, scrambling to grab precious supplies.
I search the entire house. Food, blankets and clothing have been taken. Everything else was left behind. I look out the window. Chris stands outside, staring at the cabin. He doesn’t move. He looks away, and he leaves Staff Housing. I don’t think he can handle seeing the empty cabin—the last link to his family.
I walk outside and close the cabin door behind me.
“Why do you think they left, Cassidy?” Vera asks.
She climbs the porch and touches the siding on the cabin.
“They left quickly,” I reply. “They were evacuated.”
“But why?”
“I don’t know.”
“Do you think Omega was bringing a huge force down here and they heard about it—so they just left?”
“No. I don’t think so. This was something else.”
“This doesn’t make sense.”
“No. None of it does. Not yet, anyway.”
I step into the snow. There is nothing for us here, other than shelter from the cold. There is no food or water. We are as helpless as we were when we were sitting in the cave, waiting for the storm to pass.
“Cassidy!” Uriah calls.
I do not see him, but I follow the sound of his voice. He is standing in front of two phone booths.
“You need to see this,” Uriah says.
I step beside him and follow his line of sight. The inside of the first phone booth is spray painted with blue paint, almost invisible against the dark gray booth wall and the ashy snow.
“Oh, my god,” Vera mutters.
The first booth has been spray-painted:
SAN FRAN – PNWA – URGENT
I look at Uriah.
I look at Vera.
I say, “Chris. Get over here.”
*
“San Francisco is hosting the Pacific Northwest Alliance?”
Vera looks disbelieving. All of us are gathered in Headquarters at Camp Freedom. It is dark and cold. Uriah has thrown open the windows to give us light. The table that we so often used to gather around, planning guerilla strategies—and even our most recent HALO strike—has been wiped clean. Every map and piece of intelligence has been removed.
“It could be a stupid joke,” Andrew suggests. “The message could have been meant to throw Omega off their scent.”
“No,” I say. “I don’t think so.”
“Why would the entire militia evacuate to San Francisco so quickly?” Uriah presses. “They had to be under an incredible level of duress to get out so fast. There was something more than just a call to meet. Something worse.”
“Maybe…when Omega dropped the bomb…they thought they were next,” Vera suggests. “Maybe they had no choice.”
“But why would they leave without making sure our mission was a success?” Chris says suddenly, grim. “Why would Manny Costas fail to return? Do you see his C-7 Caribou anywhere in camp? I don’t. He never came back for us. Nobody did. They left us up there. They left quickly. Way too quickly.”
“None of this makes sense,” I whisper.
“We’ve got to go to San Francisco,” Uriah states. “Radio communications are down, and our militia is gone. It’s the next best option.”
“What if San Francisco is a lie?” Vera demands.
“Then we figure out something else. But right now, we don’t have many options.”
“What do you think?” Andrew asks Chris.
“I think…” Chris begins slowly. “That someone left that message for us no more than one or two days ago, hoping that we were still alive, and that we would figure out where they went. Which means they didn’t abandon us—it meant they just had to rearrange their plans.”
“So we’re going to San Francisco?” I ask.
“Yeah,” Chris replies. “We have to.”
I nod.
“And how are we supposed to get there?” Vera asks. “They took all the vehicles.”
Silence.
“Not all of them,” Uriah says.
I look at him.
“I’ve been with Camp Freedom since the beginning,” he goes on, half-smiling. “I know its secrets. Let’s just hope they’ve left this particular one untouched.”
He moves toward the door.
As he opens it, and the cold air touches my cheeks, I feel it:
We have just taken our first step into a new world.
*
“We commend his spirit to Almighty God, and pray that he rests in peace.” Chris was standing near the foot of Alexander’s makeshift grave. His voice was low and troubled, his eyes veiled with swirling sadness. “Alexander Ramos was a good man. A fine soldier. A great friend. His sacrifice and bravery in battle should inspire all of us to remember what it is we’re fighting for, and to keep pressing on, even in light of recent…events.”
We were all standing around the grave. I felt the acidic swell of tears in the back of my throat. I swallowed and shut them out. I would not cry.
I couldn’t.
Chris dropped a handful of dirt onto the grave. I watched the grains fall through his fingers, skittering across the earth. We all held our hands to our heads, a salute to the fallen. Chris nodded, and the ceremony was over. My lower lip wobbled but I managed to keep my stony expression. I stepped up to the dirt, even with Chris.
“I’m sorry,” I said softly. “I know he was a good friend to you.”
Chris glared at the dirt. His silence was agonizing.
“We’ll survive this,” I went on. “We’ll make Omega pay—”
“Of course we will.” Chris turned to me, eyes blazing. “Because that’s all that matters to you right now, isn’t it? Getting revenge?” He shook his head, fisting his hands. “I don’t even know what to think of you right now.”
He walked away in a storm of fury.
I blinked back shocked tears. It wasn’t like Chris to snap at me, or to argue. I hadn’t said anything wrong. Yet I wasn’t so naïve as to think that I was completely innocent, either. My rage toward Omega and my thirst for vengeance had driven me to allow anger to control my actions, something Chris had repeatedly warned me against.
But he didn’t completely understand.
I needed vengeance. I was suffocating with the desire to repay.
And my need for it frustrated him. That, coupled with his grief over Alexander’s death, wasn’t making the situation any easier.
On the other side of the grave, standing in stark silence, was Uriah. He offered a raised eyebrow, and nothing more. I sighed. Uriah was someone who understood my dark side and accepted it without question. It was a relief, sometimes, to know that he realized I wasn’t a saint.
Chris held me up on a pedestal.
Uriah saw me as human.
Somewhere, I knew, there was a balance between those two. I just needed to find it.
*
Just on the outskirts of Camp Freedom, there is a large storage building. It is made of wood. Clods of snow are piled across the roof. I follow Uriah to the edifice. A large, roll-up door is sealed shut. Beside that, there is a smaller, metal door, locked tigh
t.
Uriah steps close to it and draws a small set of keys from his pocket.
“Seriously,” Vera says. “You’ve been carrying around keys to Camp Freedom all this time?”
“Nah. I just…knew where they were hidden,” he replies.
He takes one of the keys and jams it into the lock.
“Frank Hart entrusted me with one of Camp Freedom’s best-kept secrets,” Uriah says, looking at me. “I promised him I would use that knowledge wisely.”
Chris and Andrew are also here, but the rest of the team is scavenging leftover food and supplies from the abandoned cabins. Uriah opens the door. I smell gasoline. He walks inside the building, into darkness. I follow him, slowly, sniffing the air once more.
Definitely gasoline. And diesel.
Uriah flicks a switch on the wall. Low-powered, orange lights flicker to life. I hear the hum of a generator. And before us, there is a cement floor and a dozen retrofitted vehicles. Gas canisters and tools are piled on rows of industrial shelving.
“Whoa,” Vera mutters. “I didn’t know these were hidden in here.”
“Most didn’t,” Uriah replies. “It was a secret. And Camp Freedom left them behind.”
“For us,” I add.
“Most likely,” Chris says suddenly. He seems troubled that Uriah knew something about Camp Freedom that he didn’t. And it strikes me as interesting that my father would have trusted Uriah with this secret, but not Chris.
And then that small, ugly seed in my chest rears its head again:
Doubt.
I look away and place my hand on the hood of an old jeep.
“We’ve got enough gas to get to San Francisco, that’s for sure,” I say. “We should leave now. Get the team. Pile the supplies into the cars. And let’s get out of Dodge.”
Chris nods.
“Yeah.”
The ground under our feet rumbles softly, and I hear thunder. It is a low, quiet sound at first, and then it is louder, turning into a monstrous roar, like a jet ripping through the sound barrier.
I run outside and look at the sky. The swirling snowflakes make it difficult to see anything. There is only dark clouds and ash. But when I look at Chris, his expression is one of stone.
“What was that?” Vera whispers, staring.
Andrew answers,
“Another one. Another bomb.”
Chapter Four
The world is different, now. As we emerge from the snowy, slushy mountain roads, I see the valley below. It is bathed in darkness and shadows. The angry winter storms have cast their wrath upon the state, and on top of that, the ash still falls from the skies.
I am in a truck with Chris, the first in a convoy of ten vehicles, comprised of pickup trucks and SUVs. He is driving, and Vera and Andrew are in the backseat. There is an icy silence between all of us as we press our faces close to the windows of the truck, observing the scenery. Our convoy pushes through snow and debris. Occasionally, some of our team will get out and move fallen logs or snow out of the way, and then we will be on the move again.
As we drop to lower elevations, I keep a sharp lookout for any signs of enemy activity. There are none. These mountains seem to be emptying of everything—including us.
The distant boom and rattle of thunder rolls across the sky. It is deep and baritone, and it reminds me of artillery fire. I close my eyes, and I pray that we will make it to the valley safely.
“It sure looks like the end of the world,” Vera mutters.
Andrew whispers a reply that I cannot hear. Chris keeps his gloved hands firmly on the steering wheel and remains quiet. I stare straight ahead, following the curves of the road with my gaze.
We continue to crawl lower, and the snow begins to disappear, along with the pines and the firs. It is all grass and rocks and shrubs here. It is such a familiar sight. These hills were my home at one point, surviving after the EMP, hiding from Omega.
I remember those days well. They were frightening, yet they were simple. They represented my favorite days with Chris. The two of us were different, then. Nobody that I loved had died yet.
It was before I changed. Before the apocalypse took everything.
We keep dropping, making our way down the steep incline near the small, abandoned community of Dunlap. We are dark shadows of movement in our convoy, Angels of Death.
I smile grimly.
Two years ago, I never thought I would have become this. This harbinger of death, this weapon of destruction. I wouldn’t have believed that I was capable of leading, of killing. I suppose, in the end, that it merely proves that anyone—no matter who they are—can become dangerous. And to me, that should be the most terrifying prospect of all when the enemy looks into my eyes.
They should fear me, and in fearing me, they should fear all of us.
Because we have learned to fight back.
“Oh, nice,” Andrew says. “Lightning.”
A jagged streak of white lightning cracks across the distant sky. It is beautiful. Many flashes follow it, and the intensity of the thunder increases. Sheets of fresh rain begin to pour across the valley. I can see the dark streaks illuminated against the lightning, and soon enough, the rain has reached us, too.
It hammers down on our windshields, pummeling our vehicles like a waterfall. At first, it brings ash down with it, streaking against our glass and making it difficult to see. But eventually it washes it away, and for the first time in weeks, the air is free of ash.
We eventually roll through Squaw Valley. Familiar sights and sounds, like the Bear Mountain Library and the small collection of roadside inns, are no more. They have been burned to the ground, nothing more than a wisp of a memory, washed away by the ashes and the water.
When we reach the bottom of the foothills, I crane my neck and look up at the sky. It is so dark—almost black. The rain is pelting us. Massive puddles line the road. We splash through them in large sprays, speeding down Highway 180, through the fields of grass.
In the distance, I can see movement. There are people gathered around a burning barn. The rain is slowly taming the blaze, but as they see our convoy moving across the plain, they begin waving their hands and yelling in our direction. There are as many ten or fifteen of them. Two or three men begin sprinting across the field, toward us.
“What do they want?” Vera whispers.
“Help,” Chris replies, tightly. “We can’t stop. It could be a trap.”
I know he is right. The way they are running toward us smacks of utter and complete desperation. We zip by before anybody has a chance of throwing themselves in front of our vehicles. I watch the rearview mirror. One of the men from the group runs and runs after us on the road, tears streaming down his face, fading into a speck in the distance.
I feel sick in my stomach.
I look ahead.
No one says a word.
“You never used to see stuff like that,” Andrew comments, after a long silence. “In the beginning, there was desperation, but nothing like this.”
I look in the rearview mirror once again. I don’t see anyone else.
“They’re running out of food,” I say. “They’re running out of everything. Eventually, scavenging for supplies won’t do any good. Supplies are finite. People are dying.”
The number of canned goods and bottled water in this world will dwindle substantially. There are no more companies to manufacture the goods or bottle the water. The farmers are gone.
Food and water.
The two things that make the world go round.
Without it, humanity will die out.
But not before they kill each other over it.
“What if we get to San Francisco, and it’s a trap?” Vera asks.
“Then we leave,” I say.
“Thank you, Cassidy. Brilliant.”
“I’m helpful like that.”
“I’m serious.”
“I know you are.” I turn in my seat, meeting her gaze. “It will be safe.”
&n
bsp; “Keep telling yourself that.”
“Stay optimistic.”
Vera laughs. It is a dead sound.
“Hey. It’s the end of the world. Positive thinking is not going change my situation.” She looks sideways at Andrew. “Right?”
Andrew raises an eyebrow.
“What? Am I supposed to agree with you?” he asks.
“Trust me,” I say. “Just smile and nod.”
Andrew slowly looks at Vera, nods, smiles, and goes back to staring at the radio on his lap. Vera gives me a look.
“Great advice,” she says.
“Like I said,” I reply. “I’m helpful like that.”
I look at Chris. There is no hint of a smile or amusement on his face. He is made of stone as we drive, tuned out and locked down. I slowly return to my face-forward position and lean against the window.
“You’re not making this any easier,” I mutter.
Chris looks at me.
But he still says nothing.
*
I see San Francisco rise out of the fog. It is a mere skyline in the distance at first, but as we draw closer, the buildings grow bigger, and they begin to break through the clouds, glimmering against the gray sky.
I see the tips of the Oakland Bay Bridge, stretching from the mainland, connecting the city with the rest of the state. It is eerily quiet. No traffic aside from our convoy and the occasional military aircraft rumbling overhead.
The ashes remain a constant, flaking across the roads, sticking to the windshields. The sky is still dark and angry, alternating between torrents of ashy rain and eastward winds.
I remain silent as Chris navigates the abandoned freeways. There is plenty of military protection in the outer layers of the city. We have already passed two checkpoints, and there is another one coming up at the Oakland Bay Bridge.
In the back of my mind, there is the gnawing worry that the militia will not be here, and that we will have come all the way to the coast for nothing. But if that ends up being the case, there’s nothing I can do about it now.
It’s all up to fate, I guess.
As we come to a halt at the Oakland Bay Bridge, I note the taste of salt in the air and the crisp, frigid temperatures. Chris opens the door and gets out, meeting with a guard at the checkpoint. There are National Guardsmen everywhere. The American flag is flying high from the roof of a parked pickup.